Never Met a Girl Like You Before
by LaydeeGodiva
Summary: Working at Wayne Tower isn't all that exciting, save for the occasional glimpse of the hunk who runs the place. But when Evelyn finds out that hunk's secret, things start to get considerably out of hand. -Bruce/OC-
1. Lasiurus EDITED

**EDIT EDIT EDIT EDIT EDIT EDIT **

Hey there, lovelies! I'm going back and editing _Never Met a Girl Like You Before_! I'm really excited (because I've matured greatly in my writing) and I hope you enjoy the somewhat improved story. Trust me, no HUGE changes, I swear. :3

Disclaimer: Don't own Bats and all that jazz-tastic stuff.

Enjoy!

* * *

Our office was small. Only large enough for two medium sized desks, the accompanying chairs, and two filing cabinets. On one of said filing cabinets sat a small television set, brought here by myself, from my apartment. It was this TV that I was watching, my bare feet propped up on the top of my desk. I allowed a groan to escape my lips as I moved my feet to the floor.

"Blah, blah, blah, Batman, Batman, Batman. Jesus, he's all you ever hear on the news anymore! Batman saved this, he helped these people! Honestly!" I hissed. Michelle glanced over, looking up from her papers.

"Something the matter, Eve? Are you not into the vigilante types?" she asked, giggling afterward, covering her mouth with an insurance form.

"No. I'm more into the businessman type," I said, smiling as a certain brunette strutted by, acting as though he owned the place.

Which he did.

Michelle's giggle grew louder, filling the office. I glared at her.

"If I were you, and thank the heavens I'm not…"

"'Hey."

"IF I were you, I would steer very, very clear of Mister Wayne. He's not a suitable target for those little love arrows of yours," she said.

"Dear Michelle. I have sent several arrows his way already. Wayne, apparently, has some sort of anti-flirt guard or bubble around him," I said, frowning. My friend's eyes lit up, her brain suddenly sparking an idea.

"Well, Eve, Mister Wayne's birthday's in a few days," she began, tapping the end of her pencil against her lips thoughtfully.

"And?"

"Why not go?"

"Excellent idea! While I'm there, maybe I can slip something in his drink, then molest him in the parlor! Oh Michelle, what would I ever do without you?"

I laughed. She didn't.

"I'm serious, Eve. Why not go? It'd be a good chance to get to know him better, and maybe that anti-flirt guard will drop a little," said Michelle. I scoffed, turning my attention back out the door. Sadly enough, Wayne's toned ass was just vanishing around the corner. I sighed, pouting as I leaned back in my chair, looking over to Michelle.

"Well, since my target has just gone AWOL, why not catch me up on the latest gossip, Michelle?" I asked. A smile crossed her face, her eyes lighting up.

Ever since we were younger, Michelle had always known the latest gossip. Who hooked up with who; who broke who's heart; where the hottest parties where; where the cutest guys were hanging out. More recently, however, Michelle had been listening to the cops of Gotham (discreetly, of course) and picking up some very, very interesting information.

"Alright!" she cheered. "Okay, so I heard that Sergeant Gordon of the GCPD was tracking a new villain a few days ago, on top of Falcone."

"Whoa, whoa. I thought Falcone had been captured by Batman," I interrupted.

"He had been. However, according to Gordon anyway, someone busted him out of jail."

Oh yeah. Very, very interesting.

"What else?"

"Well, apparently this new villain was caught and being held at Arkham Asylum, down in the Narrows, y'know? He broke out. Now this crazy is running amok around Gotham, calling himself 'Joker' or something like it. To hear Sergeant Gordon babble on about him it sounds like this guy could be a tough match for Batman," she concluded.

"Jesus christ that's some serious shit," I mused. Michelle nodded, then shook her head back and forth. She leaned in closer to me.

"I've got something else," she whispered.

"T.S?"

"Way T.S."

"Ooh goody," I said, smiling.

"This guy showed up not too long ago, asking for Mister Wayne. Said his name was ghoul, or something like it. I didn't catch that part very well. Anyway, when the receptionist told him Mister Wayne wasn't here, this 'ghoul' decided to leave a message," said Michelle.

"Pfft. This doesn't sound odd at all," I said. Well, the 'ghoul' part did, but parents named their kids some damned weird things nowadays.

"Want to know the message? I heard that much," she asked. I nodded. "'We're in Gotham, Bruce.'"

"Yet again, not odd at all.," I sighed.

"You didn't see the guy!" Michelle burst out suddenly. "He just LOOKED like a villain! Three other guys followed him when he left. They were all dressed in black, and looked incredibly mean! Like, if you crossed their path at the wrong time, they'd just kill you! They were really spooky looking!" She gesticulated wildly with her arms. "Like, take the scariest guy you've ever seen, multiply that by ten and you've got these guys. They looked like they walked straight out of a horror film!"

"Hun, you just described HALF of Gotham!" I said, then laughed. "Not very T.S."

"Ah, but you did not see Mister Wayne's face when he heard the message, particularly who it was from. He looked between shocked, angered, and scared!" she said.

"A triple emotion attack, oh no! Call an ambulance! Those are really rare and fatal!" I chided, with a small snicker..

"I'm dead serious! He looked ready to shit himself!" she snapped, nearly shouting now.

"Who did?" a familiar male's voice came from the doorway. We both whipped around.

"Oh! Hi, Mister Fox!" I said happily, standing and smiling. I stretched out my hand, taking his in mine.

"Good morning, ladies," he said, leaning on my desk. I stayed standing a moment longer, then took my seat once more. "Want to share who you two were talking about earlier?" he asked. Michelle looked to me, and I looked to Mister Fox.

Now, I know Mister Fox and Wayne know each other pretty well. I don't think I want him knowing what Michelle and myself were talking about. Especially not the fact that Michelle had been eavesdropping on everything and even knew what was going on.

"Our apologies, Mister Fox. It's really T.S.," I said. He looked quizzical.

"T.S.?" he asked. Michelle and I laughed.

"Top secret," .we answered simultaneously.

"Ah. I see," he said, nodding and grinning.

"Oh look! Here he comes again!" I cooed, leaning past Mister Fox to look out the doorway. Wayne was passing by again, and I swooned.

"And now there's no hope of speaking to her." Michelle sighed. I however, and tuned everything out except those thoughts that flitted about in my mind. These turned to what my green eyes were picking up. It appeared to be a slight blotch of red, just beneath Wayne's jacket.

His shirt was not, nor was it ever, red.

I stood quickly, not bothering to say a word to Mister Fox or Michelle, and ran out after Wayne. My feet were still bare, which I painfully noticed on the cold marble, and they made zero noise as I pursued the man. There was no logical thought in my head at the moment, only that which told me to make no noise as I chased Wayne towards the men's room. I felt like someone from a James Bond movie. Except I didn't have a garrote wire and I wasn't about to kill someone. I slipped into the bathroom behind Wayne, quiet as a snake across silk.

As I closed myself into a stall, much more stealthily than I normally was, the door to the restroom opened. Mister Fox stood there, looking around. I quickly climbed on top of the toilet, so my painted toenails couldn't be seen. That would have been awkward and very, very bad.

"Hello, Bruce," he greeted. I peeked in-between the stall door and the frame, watching as Wayne kept his bloody spot concealed. "You haven't seen Evelyn, have you?" Mister Fox questioned. I watched as Bruce shook his head.

"Not today. I don't think she'd be in here either," Wayne replied gesturing with the hand not holding his jacket closed at the stalls. I laughed silently behind my hand. I stared back through my little peep hole, waiting until Mister Fox and Wayne had finished conversing, talking about any number of menial things. As soon as Mister Fox left, I straightened, peering over the stall.

Wayne was taking off his jacket, suspenders and tie. I watched with wide, adoring eyes as he unbuttoned his shirt.

His bleeding, albeit gauzed, wound was not the first thing to catch my eye. What did first was the large yellow and blue bruise on his upper shoulder on his back. I winced just looking at it. My eyes, however, settled on his bleeding wound. I watched as he took the gauze off, wiping at the blood with a paper towel. I heard him curse more than once. Then he turned to where I couldn't see as well. To remedy this issue, I moved slightly.

Terrible idea.

My bare foot slipped into the toilet bowl, and I pitched forward into the stall door with a shriek. The hinges did not like the sudden weight and gave way, sending the door, and myself, tumbling to the ground. I was quick to scramble under into the next stall before the door opened, revealing Mister Fox, yet again.

"Jesus, Bruce. What happened?" he asked as I clambered onto the toilet to remain hidden, holding the stall door closed with one hand. I was breathing hard and sure that I'd give myself away with my heartbeat as it pounded in my chest.

"Just an accident, Mister Fox. I got careless while I was spelunking," Wayne replied, not missing a beat. I rolled my eyes at his excuse, but it seemed to quell Mister Fox's fears of something far worse.

"And the door?" the man asked. Wayne shrugged.

"Faulty screws, I guess. I'll be sure to tell Mister Earle about it," he replied, smiling.

"Do you need any help with that?" Mister Fox inquired, pointing at Wayne's wound. The latter shook his head, assuring he had it under control. Mister Fox, seemingly satisfied now, left.

"You plan on coming out?" Wayne called after a brief second. I dropped down from the toilet and pulled open the stall door. "Any reason you were spying on me?"

"Well, you were bleeding and all. I guess I was just, y'know, a little concerned for your health," I said, staring at the tiled floor a moment. I looked up to meet his gaze. "Seeing you shirtless, on the other hand, was a definite plus." A horrible long pause filled the space between us and I tried to keep my eyes off of Wayne's chest.

"I'd appreciate it if you left." His voice was cold. I closed my eyes a moment, then headed toward the door. I turned back to see him dabbing at his wound again.

"Y'know, that doesn't look like the kind of wound you'd get while spelunking," I said, then opened the door and disappeared into the corridor.


	2. Molossus EDITED

Molossus, the **EDITED **version!

Disclaimer: Don't own Bats and all that jazz.

* * *

Bruce Wayne was angry. No, not just angry. He was infuriated. His face showed nothing as he exited the restroom, readjusting his jacket, and it remained blank as he headed for the elevator. The minute he was alone in the small car, he let out a frustrated grunt.

"Who does she think she is?" he asked himself, referring to the red headed, not to mention caught spying red handed, woman. Bruce's mind told him to calm down and to ignore Evelyn's comment about his wound. She didn't know anything about his life, or his second life. What she knew was the mask Bruce wore whenever he decided to appear anywhere around Wayne Tower. She didn't know his life, nor was he too inclined to divulge her in his secrets.

So where did she get off telling him that "That wasn't the kind of wound you'd get while spelunking?" At this Bruce chuckled at himself. Of course this isn't the kind of wound you'd get while spelunking. This was the kind of wound you get when a grenade explodes a mere four feet from where you had been standing. Even nomex and Kevlar can't make you invincible against something like an explosion.

It had, however, protected Bruce enough and he had managed to escape with only one major injury. Alfred, on the other hand, considered it near fatal and almost had Bruce sent to the hospital. Wayne had refused, saying it was not as bad as it appeared. It was, but not enough for a hospital. Not that Bruce would have let Alfred take him there willingly.

Alfred Pennyworth. Every time Bruce's thoughts traveled to his old butler it brought up words like compassion, love, care, and hope. Alfred had been there to take care of young, scared, eight year old Bruce when his parents had been murdered. He had acted as a father-figure for the rest of Bruce's years at Wayne Manor, and would continue to be until he finally passed. Surprisingly enough to Bruce, Alfred had never given up on him, even when times seemed hopeless and plans simply ludicrous.

As Bruce Wayne brought his thoughts back to Evelyn, he scowled again. The elevator reached the parking garage, and he headed for his snazzy silver Lamborghini. He lifted the door, climbed in, then roared out of the garage, heading for home.

* * *

Five stories up, looking out the window at the end of the hallway, I stood, watching as Bruce tore from the tower. I sighed, turning and heading back to my office. As I planted myself begrudgingly on the swivel chair, Michelle stared at me.

"You had to follow him, eh?" she asked. "Did you convince your knight in shining armor that you were a damsel in distress?"

"Pfft," I sputtered. "My knight in shining armor turned into a toad at the last minute," I replied, rather sullen.

"You want to tell me about it?" Michelle asked, placing her hand over mine. I shook my head.

"No. I'll get over it. What about your knight, Michelle? What's his name again? Bob?" I questioned, getting out of my depression and back to my normal self.

"Robert Cotterill," she corrected. "He's British."

"Of course he is. Is it just me, or do you always have a boyfriend from Britain?" I asked, giggling. Michelle frowned.

"So what? British men are well defined and nice! They're perfect gentlemen!" she retorted. "Besides, his ex-wife died recently, and he and his daughter need a mother figure!"

"Michelle, no offense, but you're no more a mother figure than I am a political figure," I chided. Her frown deepened."And you're just going to swoop in because his ex died?"

"They'd been divorced for—!"

Ignoring her next remark, I looked at the clock. My eyes widened. "Shit!" I cursed, standing and pulling on my shoes. I snatched up my small purse and turned to Michelle as I ran for the doorway.

"It's lunch, I'm leaving because I'm late, and I'll be back soon!" I said, shouting the last three words as I rushed down the hall, dodging between my co-workers.

Every day for lunch I left the Tower and headed to my favorite coffeehouse a few blocks away. The lateness today was due in part to the fact I was to be picking up someone at the airport in about five minutes.

I entered the elevator, which was packed, and hopped from one foot to the other the best I could as I waited to get to the parking garage.

The second I was in my car (an old, beat up station wagon) I opened my purse and pulled out a small tube of lip gloss, pulling down my mirror. "Can't believe it," I murmured. I took my hair down from its holder, letting it fall over my shoulders. Then I started my engine and took off, nearly taking the back end off a Corvette as I made a mad drive to the exit

Luckily enough for me Gotham Airport was only twenty minutes away (the way I drive) and I actually arrived at Gate E on time. The passengers of the flight were just getting off, and I looked for the locks of black I knew too well. Once they were spotted, I made my way to their owner.

"Hey Sunshine," Isaac greeted.

Isaac Fischer was, and is, my best guy friend I have. Michelle is my best girl, and Isaac is my best guy. They, however, have never met. I plan to introduce them.

Someday.

Isaac and I have been friends since three years ago, when I met him after college. He was working at the same mall store as me at the time and we made an acquaintance. We soon made nicknames for each other, not knowing just how long they'd be sticking with us. His for me was 'Sunshine.'

"Took you long enough to come visit, Shorts."

Mine for him, was 'Shorts.'

His nickname came about in a swimming pool one summer, involving a diving board and a bored five year old boy (whose mother wasn't watching him, which is why he was bothering us), afterward resulting in a pair of neon blue Hawaiian print swim trunks to be floating atop the chlorine water. My nickname, quite differently, comes from the fact I am entirely not a morning person. I could care less for mornings, wishing the day started at noon. These feeling are indeed remedied by coffee, but I am still in no way, shape or form, a morning person.

So why I work at Wayne Enterprises, where the day starts as early as seven am, I'll never know.

Oh, wait. Of course I know. The hunk that runs the place. Not that I'm terribly keen on speaking with Mister Wayne right now. Asshole.

After Isaac and I exchanged hugs, we shoved his bags into the back of my car, then drove to a small café for some much needed coffee and food.

"How's everything been?" he asked, sipping at his cappuccino as I drank my espresso.

"Routine question, Isaac. Be more creative, will you?" I said, smiling, then adding, "It's been going great. The crime in Gotham's decreased, but not much. Though I do have to admit that the Batman is helping. Even if I hate the fact he's all over the news, and no one else is doing a damn thing to stop the crime and poverty in this city." I swirled my espresso around, irritated.

"It takes nothing to sit and watch, but it takes everything to get up and do something," Isaac said, grinning. That was his favorite thing to say whenever things weren't going his way. If he didn't like something, he did something about it. Isaac had always had little quotes and things. To be honest, I never knew if he's taken them from someone or had come up with them himself. "If you want to change something, Evelyn, then take the initiative and do it."

"Pfft. Like Batman?" I asked. "Half of the police force hates him because he's 'taking the law into his own hands.' If I thought I could do something without getting tossed in jail for it, trust me Shorts, I would. But the thing is, I honestly don't think I can just throw on a cape and go running around the city, trying to end poverty and the gangs."

"You have your magic."

As yes, my mediocre magic I had learned from my father. Sleight of hand, illusions. All fake, nothing real. I could do card tricks, make balls disappear, turn handkerchiefs into doves. Practicing magic had been my father and my hobby since I was nine. Now, at twenty-five, I had doubled what I could back then. However, I was still nowhere as near as good as those such as Burton and Siegfried and Roy. I did know, however, how to do the simple things master illusionists could do. Illusionists such as Criss Angel, 'Mind Freak's' big star.

Simple things included the following: levitating several inches from the ground and walking through walls.

Isaac thought this sounded crazy at first as well. That is until I showed him.

My key item in my illusions is my chalk. Whether you believe it or not, I can draw a door on a wall, the ground, basically anything, and open it. It's not magic, it's an illusion. I could tell Isaac and Michelle how I do it, but I can't because even I don't know how. It's something I've mastered, just like my card tricks and my sleight of hand. So, as Isaac brought up my magic abilities, an idea stuck me, and I smiled.

"Oh no. Now what have I done, Sunshine? You're thinking again, I can tell. It's like your cranium has turned to glass, and I can see the miniscule gears of your cerebrum spinning like mad," Isaac said, laughing. My grin grew as I stared at his pale green eyes.

"It's not a crime to think, is it?" I said. "I'm afraid, dear Isaac, that I must leave. My lunch break's nearly over, and it'll take me twenty minutes to get back to the Tower. If you want to wander around Gotham for a couple more hours, I'll be off and can come pick you up."

Isaac shook his head, telling me it wouldn't be necessary. He would get a taxi, he just had to get his suitcase from my trunk first. I allowed him to, then departed back to my job.

As I entered the elevator, I saw someone head for the stairs. His head was bald, and he had a strangely cut goatee. I stared as long as the closing elevator doors permitted, then thought about his attire. Hmm. All black. Not that that would be odd in Gotham, but usually people take elevators when in suits. I smelled myself quickly to be sure I hadn't offended him. I concurred I hadn't, but still thought about the man. Something about his demeanor, the way he carried himself in the few fleeting seconds I saw him, made me uneasy. Not to mention the fact that he looked like some villain from a 70s ninja flick.

As I made my way to my office, I decided to stop by and make sure Mister Earle wasn't angry I was almost ten minutes late. I entered his office, not seeing him anywhere. I closed the door behind me and walked over to the computer screen on his desk.

I'm nosy, and I'll admit it with pride.

Unlocked computer screens intrigue me, even if it is in my boss's office. They're even more intriguing when it's someone I know on the screen.

On the screen Earle had pulled up a file on Lucius Fox. I wonder for a second why, when I heard footsteps in the hall. I rushed to the door, opened it and retreated from the office. Luckily enough for me, it was someone I didn't know (which wasn't surprising; Wayne Enterprises probably had half the Gotham workforce on its payroll, an d I pretty much stayed on one floor) and I fled quickly to my office.

When I reached it, Michelle wasn't there. This was odd, since she's always on time, even at the end of lunch (and at the beginning of the day and to meetings; hell, she's probably got a foolproof schedule set up so she's never late to anything, ever, unlike me, who's late to everything, always). I set my purse in my chair, then nearly shrieked at what was on my desk.

There, on top of all the papers I had to read over, sat a .38 caliber pistol. I picked it up quickly, running to the window at the end of the hallway. I opened it, then chucked the pistol down into the dumpster, five stories below. I closed the window then stood, my heart racing as fast as my mind. I began thinking that, in retrospect, I probably shouldn't have tossed the gun out the window. Well, too late, now. I started back toward the office, but before I reached the door Michelle appeared from around the corner and suddenly had my arm and was dragging me away.

"Eve! Mr. Earle's been shot!" she exclaimed.


	3. Artibeus EDITED

I was never too fond of Mister Earle. He always struck me as one to sell a child for a large sum of money or something like that. So his being shot didn't strike me as such a big issue, especially since it hadn't been a fatal wound. Sure it had knocked him unconscious (probably from the shock of being shot), but still not fatal. Needless to say, I wasn't too concerned for his health. Hell, I didn't even _like_ the guy.

As it was, however, I was being forced to stand next to Michelle as the paramedics came up and hauled Mister Earle away to the ambulance waiting below on the street.

"So what happened?" I asked Michelle.

"For once…I haven't a clue."

I had left my office at the usual time, arriving around eight in the morning the next day as is my normal routine. Something in Wayne Tower, however, was quite off. People stared as I made my way to the elevator, and they did as I walked down the hall to my office. I thought maybe my black slacks and olive button up shirt with a tank top under it, complete with black high heels, made them wary to be near me. This was even one of my normal outfits, instead of my outrageous ones I liked to wear. I also found it odd that Michelle didn't even look up as I entered our office.

"That was a weird walk up here," I said, setting my briefcase on my desk. "Did they figure out who shot Mister Earle?"

"Yeah," Michelle said quietly, still not meeting my gaze. I was about to ask her what her issue was when two police officers entered.

"Evelyn Larrabee?" one asked. I raised an eyebrow.

"That's me," I said.

"You're under arrest for attempted murder. You have the right to remain…"

"What?" I interrupted as the second cop pulled out a pair of handcuffs. He snapped them around my wrists. "And what makes you two think I did it?" I asked.

"Your fingerprints were found on Mister Earle's doorknob to his office and on the pistol we found in the dumpster, where you threw it," the first cop said. I let out an exasperated grunt.

"It wasn't me!" I shouted. "Michelle! Michelle, you cannot be believe these people!" I cried. My friend stayed quiet, not wanting to get involved.

"Michelle!"

"You have the right…," the second cop began once more.

"To kick someone's ass," I said. "You guys are making the biggest mistake of your life."

"Just be quiet and follow us," the first one said. He yanked at my arm as he and the other cop escorted me down the hallway. I ignored the stares from my co-workers.

We reached the street in front of Wayne Tower, and the cops shoved me in the back of the patrol car.

"You going to give me a ticket for not wearing my seatbelt back here?" I asked, glaring at the two cops in the front seats. They remained quiet. "You two are going to regret this."

"We take that as a threat, Miss Larrabee," the one driving said.

"It's not a threat. It's a promise," I replied. I had never been good with cops, especially not the ones in Gotham. Anyone who let themselves be buy out by thugs wasn't real high on my list.

* * *

I glared angrily at the three others in the temporary jail cell I was placed in. They glared back.

I turned to the lock on the door, making sure the guard was well down the hallway first. I pulled out the piece of chalk I had in my bra (the only safe place for it) and drew a circle around the keyhole. I stuck my arm through the bars of the cell and drew another on the opposite side of the lock.

Then I simply pushed the circle out.

It clattered to the floor and I watched in dismay as the guard turned.

"What was that?" he called, walking back toward the cell. I quickly shoved the chalk back down my bra.

"I don't know," I stated simply, giving the others in the cell the sign to be silent. The guard approached, staring down at the lock. My mind raced and I acted swiftly, slamming open the heavy metal door into the guard's head. He moaned then fell to the cement floor. I leapt over his unconscious body and rushed for the exit.

I walked smoothly through the precinct, trying to not direct any attention toward myself. Thankfully enough I was out of the precinct and on the steps before the commotion inside started up.

I heard shouts, but not for long because I had started to sprint down the sidewalk. I ducked into an alleyway, jumping over a fallen garbage sack. My heels didn't take to kindly to that and I fell face first into a puddle of who-knows-what. Trying to quell my urge to vomit, I stood and rushed the rest of the way down the alley.

My apartment was several blocks away. I walked quickly, ignoring the stares I was receiving from all of the gunk that had accumulated on my person. I climbed the stairs to my apartment two at a time, reaching for my keys.

Dammit.

I'd forgotten that those rat-bastard cops had taken them. I grunted, slamming my fist on the door. Then I tried the knob.

Leave it to me to leave the door unlocked.

I ran back to my bedroom, flinging open my closet and changing clothes. A shower would have to wait until I reached the hotel. The suitcase I had fetched from under my bed was lying open on the covers and I began to fling clothes into it. With aforementioned suitcase under my arm, I ran to get my hidden stash of 'emergency money.' With it safely in the pocket of my jeans, I left my apartment and hailed a taxi.

As I sat listening to Elton John blare through the speakers, something struck me. An epiphany, if I'm not mistaken.

"Stop here, please!" I almost shouted. The taxi driver slammed on his breaks and I tossed a twenty in the passenger seat as I climbed out of the cab. I hauled my suitcase into the costume shop, depositing it at the counter, asking the clerk to watch it a moment. I didn't wait for a reply as I rushed to the back of the store. I yanked a costume from its rack, staring at it approvingly. I grabbed a domino mask then went back to the cashier.

"Last minute party," I told the clerk as he handed me my suitcase and I placed the costume on the counter.

"Uh-huh," he said, ringing it up. I paid, and he gave me my bag. I rushed back onto the street, then walked the few blocks to the hotel Isaac was staying at, clutching the bag to my chest.

"Hi," I said to the receptionist. "Can you tell me which room Isaac Fischer is staying in?" She complied without incident, or much interest, and I boarded the elevator to the fourth floor. I walked down to suite four-oh-nine and knocked. Isaac answered.

"Sunshine?" he asked as I pushed past him into his room.

"Hey, Shorts!" I said, merrily plopping my suitcase and bag onto the floor. "I just need to hang out here for a while. As in however long you're in the city."

"What did you do!" he asked, clearly exasperated. I explained my situation, stating almost seven times that I did not shoot Mister Earle, and that I had had an epiphany.

"You know how you always say to take the initiative and do something to change all of the injustice? Well, I am. I had this great realization of just how many innocent people are probably put in jail for something they didn't do. Or how many innocents are killed because of maniacs like Falcone and his thugs! Thanks to you, Isaac my dear, I now know how I plan to change Gotham. I say piss on the cops! If they think they can arrest the Theatric Phantom, they're dead wrong!

"It's perfect! It's just the thing that I need! I can maybe even work alongside the Batman. Well, that's assuming he likes a partner. Who knows? I might even be able to take out that new villain that's running amok!" I was chattering excitedly as I paced the length of the room, gesticulating wildly with my hands.

"Whoa! Wait? The Theatric Phantom? What's that?" Isaac questioned, now sitting on his bed.

"My vigilante name. Or superhero name. Whatever you want to call it," I said, pulling out the costume I'd bought. "And this is my costume!"

"You're fighting crime in that?"

"I'm the Theatric Phantom. Why not have a magicians outfit?"

"Because it's a leotard with a bow and lace. How do you ever expect to seem intimidating in that?"

"I'm going to alter it, Shorts."

"I sure as hell would."

I admit, it was a bit frilly. But once it was free of the bow (and lace) and I had it all on, it would look way cool. Not to mention the fact that it even had a cape. I mean, honestly. What superhero is complete without a cape?

"Anyway, Shorts, like I said. I may need to be hanging out here for a few days until I can get those idiotic police off of my tail," I said again.

"Just don't get me arrested. I don't need another imprisonment on my record."


	4. Tadarida

Look! An update!

Sorry for being slow XD;;;; Go back a chapter or so to read the disclaimer please 8D

* * *

Two days later I had my costume altered and finished. I had it on, staring approvingly at my reflection in the mirror. I walked out into the living room, flaunting my outfit.

"Well, Shorts. What do you think?" I questioned my long time friend. He stared a moment, motioning with his finger for me to turn, I did so, then awaited a reply.

"I have to say I like it," he said, smiling. My eyes lit up under my mask.

"All to do now is wait for something to come along that I could help with!" I said, then sat next to Isaac on the sofa. He turned on the news, and we watched.

"I had a question, Sunshine," he began. I looked over at him. "Do you plan on learning any sort of martial arts or something? To, you know, defend yourself?" I mentally smiled.

"Well, I'd thought about adding to my expertise in karate, but I'm not sure you can go past a sixth degree black belt." I smirked.

"You never told me that!"

A shrug.

"Never felt the need."

"_Breaking news. The villain 'Joker' is…"_ I didn't wait for the newscaster to finish her statement. I stood, running toward the window.

"Eve! Wait!" Isaac cried, grabbing my arm. I turned and looked down at him.

"What?"

"Be careful."

* * *

I scurried down the fire escape, landing on the ground softly in my sneakers, then took off down the alley way. I climbed up the ladder to reach the outside stairs on the building across the way, then hauled myself onto the roof. I sprinted to the edge, stopped, looked down, walked back, then sprinted and leapt. I landed on the other building, falling and rolling to cushion the landing, then I stood.

It was like that as I building-jumped to the bank that Joker was supposedly robbing. I sprinted and leapt across another gap, landing. I stood and shrieked in shock.

Standing in front of my, in all his cape-clad glory, was the Batman. My startled shriek made him turn at look at me.

"Who are you?"

'Who am I? Who am I? Like you need to know!' I felt like saying. Instead, I replied with this:

"I'm the Theatric Phantom."

"What are you doing here?"

I fumbled for an answer. What was I doing here? I'd forgotten. Just being in his awesome presence made me stumbled over my words and my thoughts. I straightened up, finding my reason for jumping around rooftops in a leotard.

"I'm here to get the Joker behind bars."

I could almost see the twitch.

"I don't work with anyone," he replied. I almost laughed.

"Who said I wanted to work with you?"

Then I sprinted and leapt to another building, scampering down its fire-escape, and onto the asphalt in front of the bank.

Smoke poured out of the gaping hole in the side of brick. I could hear someone shouting orders inside. I pulled out my dandy piece of chalk, my only weapon at the moment, and carefully sneaked to get a closer look. Before I could get five feet, the Batman had landed in front of me.

"What do you think you're doing?" he demanded.

"Going after the villain. Isn't that was superhero's do?" I questioned.

"You're not a superhero."

I grunted at this, pulling myself to my full height.

"What makes you think that? Any idiot can throw on a cape and go parading around, trying to be a hero."

"You're calling yourself an idiot?"

Ouch. Strike two for Evelyn.

"Most certainly not," I replied. "I was merely stating the fact that if somebody wanted to do some good in this god-forsaken city, that all they'd have to do is take the initiative and do it. That's what I'm doing."

"You're not dealing with some playground bully here," began the caped crusader. "Joker is a big time criminal and he's not to be trifled with so carelessly."

"Oh, you are too kind, Fatman," came a voice from behind Batman. A gunshot followed, and he pitched forward at me. I leapt to catch him before he hit the concrete. I looked up into the white face of Joker.

"Shit."

He fired, and I immediately dropped to the ground. I quickly drew an intricate circle on the ground, then vanished in the hole I'd made.

Almost instantly my gut told me to go back and get Batman. My mind, however, decided against it and I fled deeper into the sewers. Tears streaked my face and I stopped running, crouching low beside the rushing green water. I sobbed into my hands.

"What was I thinking?" I questioned myself out loud, my voice cracking. "I probably killed him, and I almost got myself shot. I can't do this. Not against that…"

I argued in my mind for almost fifteen minutes before I reached a conclusion.

Got back and get Batman.

I stood, walking purposely back to the hole I'd created. I peeked up, and not seeing anyone, hoisted myself back above ground.

I instantly regretted it.

Police swarmed everywhere, and the Batman had vanished. I leapt back into my hideout to escape the not-so-watchful eyes of Gotham's finest, and stowed deeper into the sewers.

* * *

Several days later, Joker's robbery had been pushed to the eighth page of the newspaper, and wasn't even on the television anymore. Isaac had been nice enough to extend his stay in Gotham another week, for my own use, and I took him out to dinner.

As we were driving back from the buffet he spoke.

"I haven't seen Gotham's bat since the robbery," he said. I froze in my seat, my mind racing. What if he's been killed? Or kidnapped by Joker? My overactive imagination sent my thoughts careening into the darkest corners of my mind without nightlights.

"Neither have I," I finally said. "I hope he's okay…"

* * *

On the other end of Gotham, just outside the city limits, Bruce Wayne sat in his mansion, drinking a cup of tea in his bed. The bullet from Joker's gun had pierced the Kevlar of his batsuit, but didn't lodge itself too far into his back. That he was thankful for, as was Alfred. His butler had insisted he stay in bed for a couple days, until the wound had partially healed.

He couldn't help but think about the Theatric Phantom.

For a day, at least, he blamed her for this…inconvenience of being shot. If she hadn't tried to be the hero and stop Joker, he would have that maniac behind bars already. Part of him blamed her, but part said she was just trying to do the right thing. Isn't that what he was trying to do? The right thing? Bring justice to the streets of Gotham?

She's different, his mind told him. He shook his head to clear away these thoughts. He brushed away the blanket from his legs and stood, stretching. His back gave a twinge of pain, but he ignored it, walking shirtless toward the bathroom.

Alfred Pennyworth was downstairs, in the kitchen, fixing Bruce up a nice supper when the front doorbell rang. The butler set down the knife he was using to cut a tomato and wiped his hands on a towel. Walking toward the door, he glanced up the stairs at Bruce's room. Pausing a moment to spend a thought worrying on him, he sighed slightly. Straightening his shirt he continued his walk to the door. He opened it to reveal a young woman, around her twenties he guessed, with stark red hair.

"Uhmm…hello," she stammered nervously. "I..I was wondering if Bruce was home?"

"Of course, miss. We're just about to have supper. Would you care to join us?" asked Alfred, always polite and cordial. The woman shook her head.

"Uhm, no. I just need to talk to Bruce for a few minutes." Alfred nodded.

"Come inside, miss. I'll fetch Master Bruce," he said, stepping aside. The woman trekked carefully over the threshold, as if she wouldn't be able to get back outside. Alfred eyed her suspiciously, then went upstairs to get Bruce.

He met him halfway down the hall, still shirtless.

"You may want to get a shirt on. There's a lady here to see you," the butler said. Bruce blinked a few times, then nodded.

"Who is it?" he questioned as Alfred followed him back to his room.

"I don't know, sir. She has some quite beautiful scarlet hair, however," replied Alfred. Bruce stopped.

"Red?"

"Yes, sir."

Bruce took a deep breath, releasing it slowly. He pulled a dark, semi-tight polo from his closet, throwing it over his head. He smoothed back his hair, then walked back downstairs.

"Evelyn, hi," he greeted. She nearly jumped out of her skin at the sudden speech. Her face seemed to harden slightly when she saw him.

"Bruce," she said curtly. The billionaire could almost feel the ice hit his face. "I need to talk to you," she continued.

Uh oh, Bruce thought.

"Uhm, alright," he said. He led her into the adjoining room, throwing a shrug at Alfred's inquisitive look. The butler shrugged himself, then retreated back to the kitchen.

"What do you want to talk about?" asked Bruce. Evelyn paced a few moments, then turned upon him.

"Why didn't you defend me when I was arrested?" she asked.

* * *

I waited for an answer as Bruce fumbled to think.

"Well?"

"What would you have liked me to say?" he asked finally. I sighed in exasperation.

"Anything! Anything to say that I was innocent! You could have made up some story about talking to me or something! I was concerned for you, followed you into the men's room, tried to see if you were alright and you repay me by letting me get arrested?!" I exploded at him. I felt the tears coming as the great image I had of the 'Hunk Billionaire' crumbled apart.

"I was wrong about you, Wayne," I said, resorting back to using his last name. "I thought you were the best thing since Batman, but I was wrong. He is more the man than you could ever hope to be."

And with that I left.

* * *

Reviews are rewarded with hugs and fake plastic Batmobiles (I wish) XD


	5. Nycteris

This is an actual chapter update 8D.

Thanks for the story alerts, everyone! I really appreciate it 8D!!

Disclaimer: Do not own. Except Evelyn, Issac and Michelle 8D

* * *

Needless to say, Isaac was mildly concerned when I returned to the apartment crying my eyes out. After I told him what had happened, he was out for blood and on top of his hit-list was the billionaire I'd just left.

"Calm down, Shorts," I said, sniffing afterward and wiping my nose on the sleeve of my jacket.

"You expect me to calm down after that arrogant rich guy so blatantly told you he didn't give a care about anybody and that you should just leave? Hah!" He let loose a most uncharacteristic snort, and I began to giggle.

"Eve, this is not the time for laughter. He was a total jerk to you, and you most certainly deserve a better treatment than that," said my friend, brows creased in frustration. "Sunshine, honestly." I wiped my nose again, my giggle dying away in my throat.

"He's just a conceited playboy, Shorts," I said. "No reason to get all up in a hissy about it."

"Eve, sweetie, it matters to me when people make you cry. When somebody makes you cry, I feel it deep in my soul that it is my civil duty to talk to them about it," Isaac began. "Whether you approve or not is not my concern, but I'll be paying Bruce Wayne a visit soon."

* * *

"I take it that she won't be back anytime soon, sir?" Alfred said as he followed Bruce toward the dining room.

"I should have said something, Alfred," Bruce uttered quietly. Alfred placed a fatherly hand on his shoulder.

"You did what you needed to, sir," said the old butler. Bruce nodded, then took his seat at the dining room table.

"I have the distinct feeling that I'll be up all night trying to locate Joker. There hasn't been any sight of him since the bank robbery," he said, taking a bite of the linguini that Alfred had prepared.

"Will you be needing help, sir?"

"I don't believe so, Alfred. Though whoever the Theatric Phantom is, I'm sure we'll be after the same goal. I have a feeling I'll be seeing her again soon."

* * *

"If I were a sadistic psycho villain who robbed banks and murdered people, where would be the most likely place to hide?"

I was perched carefully atop a tall skyscraper, near downtown Gotham. I had finally procured a pair of black, flat-bottomed boots that were comfortable enough for me to squirrel around it, but durable enough that they could take a beating and still be wearable. The only thing that stood out on my outfit now was the bright LED light from my watch whenever I had to check the time.

I was positive that the Batman didn't have a watch; that he had some sort of mechanism in his cowl that he wore that told him the time. I bet it was never wrong.

My little digital was at least waterproof.

I glanced down at the screen, pressing a side button and seeing 12:26 am appear with a ghastly green glow.

"Hmmm…well, it seems nothing really important is going on," I murmured to myself.

"Do you always stand in plain sight when you're on surveillance?" came a cold, even voice from behind me. I turned quickly, nearly loosing my footing on the edge, but caught myself and faced my intruder.

The black cowl he wore hid the upper half of his face, only revealing his lips, which were pressed tightly in a thin line. Behind the cowl I could make out a pair of steely eyes, staring at me. I was simply perplexed a moment, yet again awed by the terror that struck through me whenever he was present, yet at the same time relieved that he was indeed alright after the bullet went through him.

"Do you make it a habit to sneak up on girls in the middle of the night?" I questioned, my attempt to keep my voice steady and even working. For now, anyway.

No reply.

I sighed, standing.

"Alright, I guess I'll go somewhere else and look for the Joker, seeing as you've come to claim this corner of town." I carefully tried to make my way past him, to the fire escape. His firm grip grabbed my arm, the simple gesture making his cape billow around his lower half like a dancing demon.

"It's too dangerous to go after him alone," he said in the same voice as earlier. There was something eerily familiar about it.

"Are you proposing that you come with me?" I questioned, the weight of his hand on my arm was almost overwhelming, but not entirely unpleasant nor unwelcome.

"No. I'm suggesting that you leave the characters such as the Joker to me."

"Oh, so you're saying I'm not cut out to be a superhero?" I countered.

"No. You don't understand. Criminals like the Joker, Two-Face, Scarecrow. They're not petty thieves and con artists. They have multiple homicides, robberies, anything you can name under their belt. They are not a force to be trifled with by someone such as yourself. You will end up getting killed if you try to face them head to head."

"Then why don't you help me?" I questioned. His grip on my arm loosened, and his hand went back to his side, beneath his demonic cape.

"I can't be looking out for you or worrying about you while I'm fighting," he said. "It's…complicated."

I shook my head, taking a small step back, then turned to gaze out at the city.

"It's not complicated. I'm not sure what's going through that masked head of yours, but it can't be that complicated. If you don't want me to get hurt you can just say so," I said. When no reply came, I turned around.

I was alone on the rooftop.

"You have a knack for disappearing when the situation gets too hot for you, y'know!" I called out, my voice echoing in the emptiness of the rooftop. I sighed heavily, then sat down on the edge of the bricks, my eyes flickering back to the city.

* * *

Down in the Narrows, not too far from the asylum he should be in, in a derelict apartment, sat the Joker. He raked a hand through his green hair, mussing it up more than it was. He rested his chin on his hands, and his elbows on his knees.

"You know, Harl," he called lazily over his shoulder, "we really should find some more interesting people to torture."

From behind him came an agonizing scream, then silence. Light and quick footsteps followed, and a black and red clad figure came skipping up.

"You're absolutely right, Mister J," said Harley Quinn. "We should get some kids or somethin'."

"That's a good idea, but not quite what I had in mind, Harl," said the Joker, standing. "I was thinking more of a big wig of some kind. Y'know, someone high up there. Somebody they'd come looking for if they went missing. We can kidnap 'em, then see what we can get out of them before gassing 'em and chucking 'em away somewhere."

Harley squealed with delight.

"Y'know who I think we should get, Puddin'?" she said, bouncing up and down excitedly. The clown-faced psychopath turned to look lazily at her.

"Who, Harl?"

"The Prince 'o Gotham. Bruce Wayne."

* * *

"_I'm tucking in for the night, sir," _came Alfred's voice through the communicator in Batman's cowl. Batman didn't reply, but there really was no need.

He was standing atop Wayne Tower, hiding his presence amongst the Gothic gargoyles that littered the rooftop, staring down at the city laid out before him. He grasped the corners of his cape tightly, then leapt into the dark sky.

He soared down, the cape snapping out behind him like, well, like a pair of bat wings.

His dark eyes scanned the streets below him. Surprisingly enough, however, they were rather quiet.

A scream shattered that in an instant.

* * *

I screamed.

I mean, come on. What else do you do when somebody comes up behind you, silently, I might add, and grabs your around the throat, pressing something cold and metallic to your jugular?

It wasn't a very superhero thing to do.

I took a deep breath, ignoring whatever the hell the thug behind me was saying, and also ignoring the beer fumes that were emanating so heavily from his breath. I brought my arm up in front of me, then slammed my elbow into his gut. He 'oofed', moving his knife and backing away a moment.

That was all I needed.

I turned around quickly, sending a spinning high kick at the man's head. It collided, and he went down, cursing.

I fell into an offensive stance as the man stumbled back to his feet. My top hat had fallen off in the scuffle, and it lay at my feet.

"Back off," I hissed at the man. He stumbled away, toward the fire escape on the rooftop. I sighed with relief, bending to pick up my top hat.

When I straightened back up, Batman was standing before me. I must've leapt at least three feet into the air, and I dropped my top hat again.

"You like to see people jump when they see you, don't you?" I questioned. It could have been some light trick, but I could've swore that he smiled, even if it was almost unnoticeable.

"Are you hurt?"

I picked up my top hat once again, cramming it onto my heat in an exaggerated gesture.

"No. It was just some pathetic drunk anyway," I replied. He took a step toward me and I could have reached out at touched his Kevlar lined chest.

"You need to be more careful," he said. I could almost hear some concern in his voice.

"So glad you're concerned," I said. I had the most uncanny feeling inside of me at the moment, and it happened whenever Batman was around. I'm not sure if it was fear, or if it was affection. Whatever it was, it was giving my stomach quite the time with all of the butterflies. Thoughts buzzed through my head, and I'm pretty sure were running into each other because I could barely muster up a coherent reply to his answer.

"I am."

I had most certainly not expected this. Batman? Concerned? Hah! The very gall of the thought!

So why did I believe him?

"I…I have to go," I stated, then moved past him slowly. He made no gesture that he was going to stop me. I walked quickly to the fire escape and leapt over, onto the metal ladder.

He was already off the roof.

* * *

Review, please 8D


	6. Barbastella

This is a quick update, eh? 8D

Disclaimer and whatnot: I don't own Batman Begins or any related works, titles, dadeeleedah and such the like. All Batman characters are credited to Bob Kane. 8D

* * *

"Wow."

Harley Quinn let loose an impressed whistle as she and Joker stood in front of Wayne manor.

"Billionaires have all the goods, don't they, Puddin'?" she said, her arms linked through the bend in Joker's elbow.

"They certainly do, Harley," he replied, then began to waltz forward, pulling Harley over. She stumbled back to her feet, then skipped after him merrily. Joker pulled out the handgun he had in his belt, and aimed it at the lock on the front door of the manor.

* * *

Alfred milled around the kitchen, pulling down things from the cupboards to make him and Bruce dinner that night.

The tray he held clattered to the floor as a gunshot echoed through the hall. During the three shots that followed, Alfred was already halfway to the study, and the piano that would let him down into the Batcave.

The china cabinet door was closed long before Joker and Harley made their way down the corridor.

"No one's here, Puddin'," Harley pointed out, clearly disappointed. Joker slapped her across her painted face.

"I can see that, Harley," he said. He went into the dining room, pulling a chair around and sat in it, setting the pistol on the table. "Now we wait."

* * *

"_Sir," _came Alfred's voice as Bruce maneuvered the Batmobile down the dirt path that led to the cavern underneath Wayne Manor.

"Yes?"

"_It would seem we have an unwelcome guest at the manor." _

"What?" hissed Bruce, almost stopping the Batmobile.

Alfred quickly relayed the information of the gunshot he heard to him.

"_I'm not certain who it is, and I'm not very keen on going up to find out," _said the old butler.

"I'm almost there, Alfred."

Bruce roared through the waterfall and into the cavernous lair, quickly halting the monstrous vehicle before it crashed into a stalagmite. The door opened and he leapt out, landing with a flourish of his cape.

"He, or they're, still upstairs, sir," said Alfred.

"They?"

"I'm not certain, but I believe that there are two or more perpetrators."

"And they're still upstairs? Have you called the police?" questioned Bruce as he quickly shed his Batsuit, changing into a long sleeved light green shirt and khaki pants.

"Yes, sir. It was the first thing I did when I got down here," replied Alfred as he followed Bruce to the elevator that led to the manor's first floor.

"I'm going up," said Bruce, entering the elevator. "Gordon might suspect something if nobody's home when a call was made." Alfred nodded, and Bruce went up.

He glanced through the glass of the china cabinet, making sure nobody could be seen, before he opened the secret door and entered the study. Sirens could be heard in the distance, getting louder as they approached.

_It could take them at least ten minutes to get up here, _Bruce thought as he sneaked quietly through the halls of his home. Loud noises emanated from the kitchen, and he walked that way.

"This guy's got food I ain't even heard of, Mister J!" exclaimed a voice. A bunch of clattering followed.

"Most of it certainly looks better than the slop they feed us in Arkham, Harley."

Bruce froze, his hand on the face of the kitchen's swinging door.

If that was the Harley he knew- and he only knew one- then the police needed to get here a lot quicker.

* * *

I meandered through the hotel's hallway, trying to locate the snack machine, when the small group of police cars raced past. I heard them and had rushed to the balcony at the end of the hall.

"Looks like they're headed out of town," I mumbled to herself, leaning over the railing and looking toward Wayne Manor. I couldn't help but feel a twang of concern in my gut for the opinionated billionaire. I turned, running back to Isaac's suit.

"I'm going out," I said quickly, slipping my feet into a pair of black flip-flops.

"It's almost two in the morning, Sunshine," said my friend from where he lounged in an armchair.

"So?" I asked as I pulled a jacket on over my white tee shirt. I saw Isaac shrug as I grabbed his keys and headed for his rental car.

Even with the way I drive, the two police cars were already at Wayne Manor when I pulled up at the base of the hill the large home sat atop of. I got out of the rental and walked toward the steps that led to the manor's front door.

I had my hand stretched out to tap a police officer on the shoulder, to question him what was going on, when I realized something.

I was an escaped convict.

So I thusly turned and rushed back toward the steps. I skirted around the police, toward the side of Wayne Manor.

I reached the back without much incident, and I quietly let myself in through the sliding glass door. I thought it odd that Bruce didn't have a security system. It didn't cross my mind it wasn't working.

I figured I stood in the small alcove that led to the kitchen, because I could make out a refrigerator in front of me. I sneaked forward silently, hearing an angry voice ahead.

"It seems that this house wasn't as empty as we'd first thought, Harley," Joker spat in disgust as he stared out the window at the two cops cars. "Somebody has turned us in."

"Then we should find out who's here, Puddin'," replied Harley. "Then we can wring their neck for callin' the cops!" A hysterical giggle followed, sending a chill down my spine. I crept forward more, seeing as I had no other option, and carefully looked into the kitchen.

Joker had his back to me, Harley standing in front of him. She suddenly flipped over her "employer" and landed right in front of me.

"Think I found her, Puddin'!!" she shouted, grabbing a large handful of my hair and pulling me forward.

"Ow! Ow ow ow!!" I cried as she pushed me to the ground, hand still clutching my hair. Joker was kneeling in front of me, and he took my chin in his hand.

"Either you haven't heard of me, or you're just stupid," he said, a crazy grin spreading over his face. "Whichever it is, you've made a big mistake."

* * *

"You were right," Bruce said as he came back down the elevator. Alfred looked at him.

"About what, sir?"

"There are two. Joker and Harley Quinn."

The old man visibly paled.

"What could they want?" he questioned. Bruce shook his head.

"I'm not sure. But it could be anything with those two," he said. He walked over to the computer console and pressed a button, switching the screen to show the front of Wayne Manor. "The police have showed up and…," he stopped, eyes glued to the screen. "Oh no."

* * *

"Everything's fine, officer!" I said as I walked slowly down the drive. I hoped they wouldn't recognize me with my hair up and a hat on. One of the cops approached me.

"We got a call about a break it. Is Mister Wayne home?" he asked, his voice low and gruff. I shook my head.

"Hasn't been here for a few hours. Think he's out partying," I said, shrugging nonchalantly. My heart was pounding so loud that I was sure he could hear it. If he couldn't he must've been deaf.

"And the call? Did you make it?" the cop questioned. I shook my head.

"No sir. Think it may've been some prankster or something. Maybe the butler thought he heard something," I said.

"And where's the butler?"

I shrugged.

"Don't know. He ain't here, though," I replied.

"Who did you say you were?" he asked.

"Me? Well, Bruce and I had a little…hmm…_thing _and he let me stay the night. Been here waiting for him to get back since he left," I replied. I pretended to yawn.

"Well, ma'am, if nothing's wrong then we'll be on our way," said the cop. I smiled and nodded.

"Nothing's wrong! Nothing at all!" I said, then waved as he went back to his car. I waited until the two patrols were out of the drive before I took off the hat.

"Good work," Joker called from the doorway. The pistol was visible in his hand. "Now come back inside." I turned, my mind racing. If I ran, I was dead. But if I stayed I was as good as dead anyway. So I trudged up to the front door and back into the house.

"What's your plan, Joker?" I hissed as I passed him. He just laughed, prodding me forward with the barrel of the gun.

"I'll tell you when you've served your purpose with me."

I gulped.

"Harley!" he shouted down the hallway. No reply came. "Hey! Harley! Haaaaaarleeeeeey!!" He pushed me into the wall, then continued down the hall. "Where'd you go, Harley?!" he shouted. I took this opportunity to run towards the front door. My flip-flops clapped on the marble floor loudly and Joker turned.

"Hey!" he shouted. I didn't turn, but kept running. "Your purpose just ran out!"

* * *

Bruce had just finished making sure that Harley wasn't going anywhere when the gunshot echoed through the house.

"Evelyn," he breathed, and rushed into the corridor.

* * *

Oh dear. What a cliff-hanger this is. Reviews are highly appreciated and loved 8D


	7. Macrotus

Disclaimer: Don't own Batman and that ole cup o' tea.

* * *

I was certain that I'd been shot, but I felt nothing. Maybe that's what happened when you got shot. You just didn't feel anything.

I wished I was right.

I didn't realize I had my eyes squeezed shut until I pried them open and stared at the cool marble of Bruce's floor. Then I saw the blood that was slowly flowing past my right flip-flop. I turned.

Then screamed.

"Isaac!" I shouted, collapsing to the floor next to my best friend. I took his head in my hands, setting it in my lap. His eyes were closed, and a small dribble of blood streamed from the corner of his open mouth. His bloody chest wasn't moving as one should with the labor of breathing. I could feel the tears accumulating in my eyes and bile rising in my throat. Something cool pressed to the top of my head and I looked up.

Joker stood above me, and the cool thing I'd felt had been the barrel of his gun.

"Looks like I missed ya," he said, grinning. "But I won't now." He cocked the gun, loading another deathly round into the chamber. I just sat there. I couldn't move; couldn't think. My mind was screaming at me to run, to go somewhere, but my muscles wouldn't comply. It was like I was a robot, and someone had pressed my off switch. I sat there staring death in the face, and I couldn't do a damn thing about it.

They say that your life is supposed to flash before your eyes before you die. Boy do they lie. All I could think of was that this was one cruddy way to go. Shot down by a homicidal maniac in the home of someone you don't even like.

At least you tell yourself you don't like.

As I waited for Joker to pull the trigger, several things happened at once. First, someone shouted at the criminal, and he turned, firing his pistol. Then he looked as if some three hundred pound quarterback had just body slammed him, because he flew sideways into what I assumed was the parlor or something. I stared after him wide eyed, then looked up at who'd just saved me.

It was Bruce.

He kneeled down by me, looking at Isaac's corpse. I looked down again, surprised. I think I'd forgotten he was there, because new tears came and I felt the undeniable urge to vomit. I set Isaac's head on the floor and stood, running for the nearest place I could, which was out on the front walk. I doubled over and proceeded to retch all over Bruce's drive.

When I finally stumbled back inside, Bruce had covered Isaac's face with a suit jacket. He stood to the side, looking at me sadly, holding one arm. I saw blood around his hand on his green shirt.

"You were shot!" I exclaimed. He looked down at his arm, then shrugged.

"Oh ho-ho! You think you're funny, don't you Brucey?" came Joker's voice. He stumbled from the parlor, a bit of blood on his forehead. He still wielded the pistol, and it was level with Bruce's chest.

"I'M THE ONLY FUNNY ONE HERE!" shouted Joker, then fired.

"NO!!" I screamed, making for Bruce.

Nothing happened.

Joker pulled the trigger again, only to have it click each time. He began to chuckle, then downright laugh.

"It's empty!" he squealed as he continued his mad laughter. Bruce began to walk toward him, and the madman backed up.

"Harley!" he yelled. She came immediately, free of the ropes Bruce had imprisoned her with.

"Should really tie better knots, hon," she said, smirking as she twirled part of the rope around her fingers.

"Shut it, Harley," Joker commanded. He pulled out a small sphere. "Gotta run, Brucey. But we'll be back!" He threw the sphere down and it began to emit green gas.

"Evelyn! Get back!" I heard Bruce shout. He grabbed my arm and rushed me down the hallway. Joker's maniacal laughter echoed through the house. Bruce gently shoved me into a room, then closed the door, quickly telling me to stay there.

I stared at the closed door for at least a minute before I turned around. I was in a bedroom, and I assumed it was his by the suits that were in the closet, and the one jacket that had been thrown over a chair. I walked slowly to his bed, standing above it silently.

Then I laid down on it and started to sob.

* * *

Bruce had vanished back into the Batcave. He retrieved a gas mask, and quickly relayed Alfred a summary of what had happened.

"It can wait," Bruce said as the old butler fussed about his arm. Gas mask on, he returned upstairs.

The green fog was thick around the small smoke bomb. Bruce walked through it, opening the front door and all the windows around him. He grabbed a large fan from his storage closet- not exactly the use he'd bought it for- and set it up in the hallway. He plugged it in, then turned it on, watching it blow the toxic green smoke from his home. Alfred came up behind him as he removed his gas mask.

"Where is Miss Larrabee, sir?" he asked. Bruce nodded toward his room. "Shall I get her, sir?" Bruce shook his head.

"I will. You call the police again. Don't say anything about Evelyn, but tell them everything else. And that we have a body." He cast a glance at Isaac's corpse.

"Done, sir," Alfred replied, then tooled to the kitchen, where the phone was. Bruce walked slowly to his bedroom, then pressed an ear against the door. When he didn't hear anything, he opened it quickly.

She was asleep on his bed, tear tracks down her face and small wet spots on the pillow. He walked up to the bed silently, kneeling down by her face. He pushed her hair out of her face, then just sat there, staring at her.

"Master Bruce," came Alfred's voice from the door. "I've called the police, sir. They're on their way."

"Good, Alfred," Bruce replied as he stood. He pulled the comforter carefully over Evelyn, then turned, walking out of the room.

* * *

I was awakened the next morning by somebody yanking the blinds open, pouring the morning sunlight onto my face.

"Close those, Isaac!" I whined, not thinking. I looked over, and for a moment it looked like him. His lazy black locks framing his face, and his pale green eyes sparkling in the sun. Then he moved, and the image was immediately replaced by one with brown hair and equally brown eyes.

Bruce stood there, looking down at me. He seemed to ignore my first comment-at least the Isaac part- because he replied with "Good morning to you, too."

I threw the comforter off of my legs and stood, facing him.

"I-I'm sorry," I said quickly. "For, y'know, kind of stealing your bed like I did." He shrugged.

"That's alright. I have plenty of guest rooms, so I still had a bed," he replied. I looked at the bandage around his arm, and last night came flooding back like a plague of lotus. He followed my eyes to his wound. "It's nothing, really," he said, thinking I was concerned about him.

"Where's…," I trailed off a moment.

"Isaac?" he finished for me. I nodded meekly. "The corner took him to the Gotham morgue. I told them I had him over as a guest when Joker showed up. I'm pretty sure he followed you here, though. I've called his family, and paid for the funeral, " he said. I was at a complete loss.

"Why?"

"Why what?"

I cleared my throat.

"Why did you do all of this for me?" I asked, folding my arms over my chest. He was silent, contemplating, for several tense moments.

"The car's out front, for you to take Miss Larrabee to retrieve her things, sir," the old butler said suddenly, making me leap in surprise.

"Great!" Bruce said to Alfred. He turned to face me. "Let's go get your things, Evelyn." I stared at him in disbelief.

"What do you mean?" I questioned as I followed him down the hall. He looked back at me over his shoulder.

"You're going to stay here," he said. I stopped, my face growing hot with the thought of staying in Bruce's house.

"You don't…no. I can find somewhere," I said quickly, resuming my pace and catching up to him.

"Nonsense, Miss Larrabee," Alfred said, smiling. I stopped again, staring at the two of them angrily.

"But why!?" I shouted. "Why are you doing all of this for me?!" They looked at me, then each other, then back to me. Bruce turned and kept headed outside.

"Wayne! Get the hell back here!" I screamed, starting after him. Alfred's hand on my arm stopped me.

"We both care deeply about you, Miss Larrabee," he said.

"Then why can't Wayne say it to my face?" I spat hotly.

"Master Bruce is…" Alfred paused. "Having an inner conflict at the moment, miss," he said. "He made me promise not to tell you, and I plan to uphold that, but I can tell you this: Master Bruce cares a lot about you, Miss Larrabee." He turned and walked after Bruce, telling me not to doddle and follow him. I stood in the expansive hall a moment longer, then trailed after the two of them.

* * *

It didn't take me very long to gather up my few things from Isaac's suite. I shoved his things in my bag as well, being careful with the picture of the two of us he had. It was back in college, and he'd flown us to Hawaii with his dad's money. It was a photo of us in front of a giant tiki head with leis on. We each held a bottle of Smirnoff, our arms over each other's shoulders, laughing.

"It's a nice photo."

Bruce startled me, to say the least. I nearly dropped the picture as I fumbled to keep a hold of it when I jumped in surprise. I turned around to face him, my heart pounding in my ears.

"Please don't do that," I said. He chuckled, apologizing.

"It is though," he repeated, referring to the picture. I looked down at it.

"He got so hammered that night," I said, remembering. "I remember…we went scuba diving the next day, as a lesson, and we both had terrible hangovers. The scuba instructor absolutely hated us." I laughed sadly. I could tell Bruce wanted to say something, but he bit his tongue and remained silent. I threw the photo in the suitcase, then zipped it up. I walked past Bruce and into the hall.

"Are you ready to leave, Miss Larrabee?" questioned Alfred. I looked around the suite one last time before I nodded.

One last morbid thought flew through my head as we re-entered Bruce's Lamborghini. _At least now I'm the only one who knows who the Theatric Phantom is. _

* * *

Reviews are greatly appreciated and encouraging 8D Thought not as much as all of the alerts!


	8. Vespertilio

Sorry for the shortness of this chapter XD

Disclaimer: Don't own Batman and yadda yadda. But Evelyn, Michelle and Isaac are mine. MINE I TELL YOU.

Read and enjoy

* * *

"You have your choice of a room, Miss Larrabee," Alfred was saying as we walked down the upstairs corridor. My eyes scanned the walls, taking in the beautiful works of art and such that adorned them. Wayne didn't strike me as the type to hang these, so I had to assume it was either Alfred or Wayne's late parents who'd done it.

"Miss Larrabee?" I realized I had stopped when Alfred said my name. I looked at him, and saw he was almost at the end of the hall. I hurried down the corridor and caught up with him,

"Sorry," I said. "I think this one'll be fine." I pointed to the closest room. Alfred nodded, opening the door for me.

"If you need anything, Miss Larrabee, please don't hesitate to ask," he said, smiling. Then he left. I looked around the expansive room, taking it all in.

The bed wasn't too extravagant, but it was still better than mine in my apartment. It had more pillows, for one, and about three more blankets. I walked over and sat on it, then laid down on my back, staring up at the ceiling. I stayed like that for a few minutes, at least, then I stood, dragging my suitcase across the floor and to the closet. I opened the door, then opened my suitcase.

The photo of Isaac and me was on top of everything else. I picked it up gingerly, running my thumb over Isaac's face. My stomach tightened slightly, and I took a deep breath. Didn't need to start crying again. I set the picture to the side, on the floor, and began to unpack my clothes.

I hung up Isaac's things on one side of the closet, then put mine on the other. I pulled out my Theatric Phantom outfit and stopped.

"I can't just expect Wayne to let me out of the house at some ungodly hour," I said to myself. "He'll think I'm some sort of nutter!" I frowned, setting my leotard in my lap. "I'm going to have to sneak out, and then somehow get back in before Wayne wakes up," I decided, standing and shoving my outfit deep into the recesses of the closet. I threw my mask and boots back there as well, then took up my top hat. I held it for a few seconds, deciding it just got in my way when I was trying to fight. I tossed it into the top of the closet.

"Miss Larrabee." A knock came at my door, and I jumped. I crossed the room and opened it.

"Hey, Alfred," I said, trying not to act too suspicious, as if he'd heard me talking to myself.

"I've just prepared us a little lunch," said the butler. "Would you care to join us?"

"Uh, sure! I'll be down in a sec," I said, then closed the door, not waiting for a reply. I ran back to my suitcase, throwing my hairbrush and toothbrush on the bed, followed by the rest of my hygiene products. I ran the brush through my hair a few times, then made sure I had no flyaway ends in the mirror.

Satisfied, I headed toward the dining room.

It took me several minutes to navigate through the mansion and find it, however, and Bruce and Alfred were already at the table.

"Uh. Sorry," I said lamely. "I think I got lost." Bruce laughed and I sat, my face down to hide the blush that was steadily growing.

* * *

"Where's Wayne?" I asked Alfred that night, before I decided to head up to bed.

"Master Bruce? Oh, he's out tonight," he answered.

"With who?" I questioned. Not that it was any of my business or anything. The old butler merely shrugged.

"With Master Bruce, one can never be sure," he said, chuckling a little afterward. I left it at that, and went up to my room. Once my door was closed, I ran to my closet, reaching back and grabbing my Theatric Phantom garb. I dressed quickly, heading for the window as I put on my mask. I opened it and leaned out, looking for something that would make it relatively easy for me to climb down.

Of course nothing was ever that easy.

I sighed in frustration, closing the window and heading across the carpet for the door. I opened it carefully and peered out. Alfred was still downstairs, I assumed, so I exited my room, shutting the door behind me, and made my way down the corridor.

I reached the staircase without incident, and the front door was almost in sight. I slid down the banister, landing swiftly on my feet. Alfred still wasn't in sight, so I quickly crossed the foyer and headed outside.

I stood in the shadows of the front drive for a moment, deciding which would be the easiest- and safest- way to get into Gotham. I settled on heading into the small patch of trees that looked like it ran toward the highway. I melted into the shadows of the pines and began to jog. What came next was more than a surprise.

The small grove spat me out suddenly onto what looked like a service road. To the right I could see the lights of the city, and to the left there was the sound of rushing water. Deciding that Gotham could wait, I began to make my way left.

Soon I found myself standing before a massive waterfall. I peered behind it-or at least tried to- and could barely make out a cave. The only problem with me reaching said cave was the huge crevice below me that the waterfall fell down into.

"Well shit," I said, looking over the edge. I looked around, hoping to find a narrower spot, so maybe I could jump across. I had no such luck, so I turned and headed back toward Gotham.

As I walked along the service road, I let my mind wander, figuring I needn't keep up my guard until I reached Gotham. I thought about how I was going to avenge Isaac. About how I was going to find Joker and about how many ways I could kill him. I was also trying to think of something clever I could say to him before I killed him. Something cool, like they say in the movies. I ran through a list of phrases in my head, but none of them really fit so they all got scratched. I had my brow furrowed in thought, and I had stopped walking.

"Dammit!" I said, stomping the ground angrily. A faint noise reached my ears then, and it sounded like a truck or something, coming down the service road. I jumped into the trees, ducking to where I could still see the road, but whoever was on it couldn't see me. The sound got louder and louder, and I strained my eyes to see the dark road ahead of me. A black shape sped past, and I stood, looking after it. I ran out onto the road, peering into the darkness before me. It was only broken by sudden firelight, as if someone had just lit a rocket. I stared in disbelief, long after the monstrous black vehicle had vanished into the cave beneath the waterfall. I ran forward as quietly as I could, trying to see if I could get a glimpse of whatever it was.

I reached the waterfall, but just as before I couldn't see anything but pitch blackness. Then a light came on, and I instinctively ducked. Now the cave was illuminated, albeit dimly, and I could make out what the vehicle had been. My eyes grew wide under my mask, and I gasped.

I was staring at the Batmobile.

I not only couldn't believe it, but I couldn't believe more that I had just found where Batman hid during the day. My green eyes scanned the cave, trying to catch sight of the caped crusader who'd degraded me on more than one occasion. I sat there for several long minutes, carefully looking to see if any movement occurred. Nothing happened. Determined, I quickly came to a dangerous conclusion.

I was going to jump the gap and enter the cave.

Sure it had a lot of flaws, such as the width of the gap and the slippery landing I'd have. Not to mention what Batman would do when he caught me. But the way my mind was working at the moment I dismissed these thoughts and began to walk backward.

I was several dozen yards away before I stopped. I took a deep breath, then started running.

I was about half way to the cave when the Batmobile roared back through the waterfall. I stopped dead, caught in its headlights. Then I did the sensible thing and threw myself to the side, into the trees. I heard the giant thing come to a screeching halt and I quickly leapt to my feet. I started running back toward where I thought Wayne Manor was, not waiting to see if Batman was following me.

Things seem a lot more sinister at night, and they're magnified when you're being chased by a masked vigilante. I stopped behind a large elm to catch my breath, looking back to see if I was still being pursued. A sharp pain shot through my knee and I winced, looking down. I couldn't see anything, so I felt around my knee, my hand contacting with sticky blood and ripped nylon.

"Oh this is just bloody great," I hissed, kneeling on my uninjured knee to get a better look at the injured one. "Looks like I need a new pair of tights," I said to myself, temporarily forgetting I may still be being hunted. I cursed several times, then stood and started to make my way back to the manor.

I was glad that I had indeed chosen the right way, because the forest opened up and I saw the mansion on the hill. I sighed and made my way up to it cautiously. Only the lights in the kitchen were on, but I saw no movement through the windows. I walked up to the front door and turned the knob.

"Oh just my luck!" I cried in exhaustion at the locked door. I reached for my handy chalk, only to find it had fallen out of my boot at some point. I clenched my fists, cursing, then sneaked to the back of the manor. I was vaguely reminded of a couple nights ago, and I just hoped that no homicidal maniacs waited in the kitchen. I opened the back kitchen door, smiling that it was unlocked. I stepped forward lightly, grimacing as I looked down at my knee in the light. I peered around the corner.

The kitchen was empty.

I sighed with relief as I made my way across it and to the door that led to the foyer. I pushed it open and stealthily crept across the dark room to the stairs. I climbed them quickly, then rushed down the hall to my room. As soon as I was safely closed inside, I took off my mask, sighing again.

"What a night," I said as I threw my mask across the room, onto the bed. I took off my Theatric Phantom outfit, frowning as I fingered the hole in the tights. Shrugging I threw the entire thing back into my closet, closely followed by my mask, then pulled on my pyjamas. I flopped down on the bed and fell asleep.

* * *

Review, please 8D


	9. Eptesicus

Wowza. Thanks for all of the alerts, everyone! I give you all internet hugs and tiny plastic Batmobiles! I wish XD

Here's the next chapter for you awesome watchers!

Disclaimer: Don't own Batman and all that old cup 'o Joe.

* * *

I sat on my bed the next morning, examining my knee. I figured I needed a good excuse for Alfred and Bruce for why I was limping. I couldn't very well tell them I'd been out last night, sneaking around a cave and avoiding a masked vigilante. I honestly couldn't say I thought it was the best idea.

So I settled on faking a trip in the hallway. I stood and hobbled for my bedroom door. As I made my way down the hall I intentionally fell, but onto my bum. I uttered a loud curse as I rolled onto my knees just as Alfred appeared at the top of the stairs.

"Miss Larrabee!" he exclaimed, rushing to my side. "What happened, miss?"

"Tripped over my own feet," I lied, faking a wince. I let him help me to my feet, then I took a few fumbling steps forward.

"Seems you may have injured something, miss," Alfred said, looking curiously at my legs. "Shall I get you some ice?"

"That would be awesome," I replied as I carefully made my way down the staircase. I leaned on the railing for support. I reached the dining room and collapsed into a chair at the table. Alfred entered moments later with a towel filled with ice. He handed it to me, and I pressed it to my knee. I then realized we were short one person.

"Where's Wayne?" I asked suddenly. "Or is he not joining us for breakfast?"

"Master Bruce is still asleep, miss," replied Alfred.

"Did he get a little wild with his date?" I asked, chuckling a little afterward. Alfred simply nodded, grinning.

"Might I interest you in some breakfast, miss?" he asked as he noted the loud grumble my stomach had just made. I nodded sheepishly, busying myself with the ice on my knee to avoid his gaze. He disappeared into the kitchen, and I relaxed slightly. The door ahead of me opened and Bruce appeared.

"Good morning," he greeted, heading for the kitchen. I gave him a small nod. I watched him vanish into the kitchen and I stood, stumbling after him. I leaned on the kitchen door's frame.

"Could you drive me into the city?" I asked, looking at him. Bruce looked away from his mug of coffee to look at me.

"Sure. I can have Alfred drive you. When?" he asked, going back to dumping sugar in his drink.

"After breakfast. I need to do some…some things," I said, trying to sound convincing. I shifted my gaze back to my knee and I didn't see the skeptic glance pass between the two men.

"Certainly, Miss Larrabee," Alfred said. He handed me a plate of food and I smiled, making my way back to the dining room to eat.

* * *

"Thanks again, Alfred," I said as I sat in the back of the black Mercedes.

"Not a problem at all, miss," he replied. "Where is it you wanted to go?"

I couldn't tell him I was going to talk to a bunch of mob bosses to try and find Joker, so I settled with telling him I needed to go to the library. He obliged merrily and turned onto Main. I thanked him again as he pulled up in front of the library.

"Here's my cell-phone number, in case you need to talk to me," I said, handing him a slip of paper. I waited until he pocketed it, then opened my door. I got out and limped up the steps, disappearing into the building. I waited until the Mercedes was out of sight before I hobbled back onto the street.

"Alright," I said, patting my pant pocket to make sure my chalk was there. "I just need to figure out where the mob spends their days!"

* * *

I'm pretty sure Alfred dropped me off around eleven, and my little digital watch now read nine thirty-eight. I leaned against a wall and sighed, rubbing my sore knee.

"Jesus, this is taking longer than I thought," I said, frustrated. The street seemed darker suddenly, and I looked up to see grey clouds move in overhead. "Wonderful," I hissed as rain began to pound down. I retreated into the nearest building, which happened to be a restaurant. I peered outside at the rain, then turned to face the rest of the restaurant. I sat at the counter, running a hand through my hair.

"Can I get you anything?" asked the woman behind the counter. I shook my head.

"Just trying to get out of the rain," I said, smiling. She returned a smile, then went off to cater to a gentleman at a table.

"More coffee, Mister Maroni?"

I whipped around. Salvatore Maroni was one of the men I was looking for. I grinned at my luck and stood, walking toward his table.

"Salvatore Maroni?" I asked, as if I could have possibly been wrong. I didn't wait for a reply as I took a seat. "You're a hard guy to find, you know that?"

* * *

"She hasn't called yet?" Bruce asked as Alfred noted Evelyn had been gone for over ten hours.

"No, sir," said the butler. "I'm not sure as to who she is, exactly, but I've never known someone to mill around the library for ten hours."

"Have you called her?" questioned Bruce as he stood. Alfred nodded.

"Several times, sir. All I got was her voicemail."

"You said she was at the library, right?" Bruce asked, grabbing his suit jacket. Alfred nodded.

"Shall I pull the car around, sir?" he asked, reaching for the keys that hung in the kitchen. Bruce nodded as he pulled his shoes onto his feet. He followed Alfred outside and toward the Mercedes. They had just gotten down the first few steps when Bruce stopped and stooped to pick up an envelope from the ground. He turned it over in his hand, sliding his fingernail under the flap to open it.

"What is that, Master Bruce?" Alfred asked. He had stopped and was now staring at his charge. Bruce shrugged, pulling out the piece of paper the envelope contained. A picture fell out onto the pavement and Alfred stooped to pick it up. He stared at it, horrified, as Bruce read the letter.

"That….sadistic bastard," he muttered, crumpling the letter and snatching the picture from Alfred's hands. He stared at it, then crumpled it as well. "She's not at the library, Alfred," Bruce said as he hurried back up the steps. Alfred was on his heels.

"Will you be going after her, sir?" he asked as they reentered the manor. Bruce nodded, heading for the elevator that would lead him down into the Batcave.

"I have to," he said. "I just hope she's still alive."

* * *

I'll admit. Talking to a mob boss to try and find Joker was not one of my more well-thought-out plans. I found Joker, which is what I had wanted. The trouble with that was, I didn't work out a plan for when I finally found him. Not to mention the fact I hadn't had a weapon.

Long and gruesome story short, I was a prisoner now. I'm pretty sure I had a concussion, or my throbbing migraine was coming from all of the blood that had to have rushed to my head by now.

Did I mention it probably wasn't the smartest thing to say that Bruce and I knew the Batman's identity? I figure, you know, that maybe that would make Joker more inclined to talk to me, so I could exact my revenge. That certainly didn't work out as planned. Maroni had told Joker what I had said, and then I was being herded down some hallway and into a dimly lit room with a couple of psychopaths. I thought Joker was going to kill me when he realized just who I was, but he seemed surprisingly pleased.

I probably should have taken that as a bad sign. I didn't. I figured that was good, considering he wouldn't want to kill me if he was pleased to see me.

I should really start reading up on the nature of psychopaths.

Before he knocked me out he told me that he was going to send a note to "that rich boyfriend of mine." He said since I wasn't going to reveal Batman's identity that he was going to make Bruce tell him.

I could only hope that Bruce was smarter than to come and investigate. Hopefully he would call the cops.

However, as I hanged upside down over the edge of a god-knows-how-many-storey-building, I couldn't hear any sirens. It was either due to the fact that I was becoming incredibly light-headed from the blood rush, or that there weren't any. I really hoped it was the former of the two.

The one good thing about this whole situation was that Joker hadn't tied my hands. I guess he suspected that I wouldn't be too keen on untying my feet over such a tremendous death dive. He would be right on that point. My untied hands, however, made it easy for my to grab my chalk and begin to think of a plan.

The only problem was that my chalk couldn't help me much here. The one thing I could do to help would be to transmute the beam I was dangling from to where it curved, so I could safely deposit myself onto the unfinished floor to my left. That left me completely unguarded against the lone figure that watched over me. I wouldn't call him a guard, since he wasn't doing a very good job at anything except napping. He did, however, have a gun, and I'm sure my transmuting would catch his attention.

Not to mention trying to shift the form of something with such a complicated atomic structure would mean I would be out of it for a day, at least.

So that plan was scrapped. I was just starting to think of another one when a loud roaring came from below. I craned my neck so I could see the street below and the gargantuan vehicle speeding down it. I could only think that Bruce must have connections somewhere, or that Batman just happened to see my swaying scarlet hair from the streets of Gotham. Whichever it was, I was sure glad to see him.

For once he wasn't sneaking up on me, either.

* * *

Bruce, now clad in his Kevlar-line Batsuit, roared into the bottom floor of the unfinished skyscraper. It overlooked Gotham Harbor, but he wasn't here to do any sightseeing. He came to a screeching halt, sitting for several moments in the Batmobile before he opened the top and jumped out, landing with a flourish of his black cape. He found it odd that Joker didn't have guards stationed.

"_So she was right." _Joker's voice echoed around him. "_They DO know how to talk to the Bat-man." _

"Where are you?!" shouted Batman, turning full circle. A chilling laugh filled the expansive space.

"_Ah, ah, ah," _tutted the Joker. "_Should you really be wasting time on me when her life _hangs _on a string? Or a rope, rather." _Another laugh followed. "_Oh, and you might want to hurry. I can't see the timer, but I'm sure you're only down to a few minutes!" _Joker's laughter was cut off and Batman took off in a sprint, heading for the elevator shaft. He stopped short, staring wide-eyed at what was now surrounding him.

Oil drums. Dozens and dozens of them. What looked like C-4 was planted on the support beams of the building. Uttering a curse, Batman stole away from them and into the elevator. He clambered up onto the top of it, then grappled to the top floor. He ran past several more oil drums, and could only assume that they were planted on every floor.

Evelyn was in sight when the explosions began.

* * *

The rumbling started from below, and I shot a look downward. The lower floors of the building were spitting out flames and plumes of smoke like I'd never seen.

"Oh shit! Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!!" I said, twisting and turning as the flames climbed higher in the building. They were only a couple floors away, and I could feel the heat of the fire on my face. Something ran into me, ripping my feet free of the rope with a vicious jerk.

Then I was free-falling, not knowing that I was desperately clinging to the chest of my savior. I managed a look downward and realized that we were heading straight for the murky waters of Gotham Harbor.

"Oh shit!!" I screamed, clutching the familiar Kevlar chest tighter.

"Hold on!" I heard Batman shout as he tightened his grip around me as well. Right before we hit the water I took a deep breath, squeezing my eyes shut.

The water came up to meet us and we hit with such force that I was surprised I wasn't ripped from Batman's grasp. I don't know how far we sank, but I could feel the caped crusader kicking his feet to bring us back up to the surface. I kept still, figuring I would get in the way if I tried to help swim.

It seemed like an eternity before we broke the surface, and I took in the biggest gulp of air I could manage. I coughed and sputtered slightly as Batman swam with me toward the shore. He helped me onto the pebbles and sand and I laid on my back, breathing heavily. I could hear him doing the same to my right.

"Are you…are you alright?" he asked between gasps of air. I nodded, then realized he couldn't see it in the darkness.

"I'm….okay…I think," I managed to say. I got a hold on myself after a few more moments, and I sat up, clutching my soaking body. The rain from earlier began to start up again, and I looked up, cursing the sky several times. Then I turned to look at Batman. I could barely see him in the almost non-existent light, but I could see a tuff of wet brown hair shining in what little light there was. The realization hit me like I'd just fallen from a thirty-storey building to collide with ice cold water.

Batman wasn't wearing his mask.

I wasn't sure of the reason that it was gone, and I didn't much care. At that moment all I wanted to know was his secret identity. I began to crawl over toward him. He was sitting now, and I'm pretty sure he looked up at me.

"Stop," was all he said. His voice rooted me to the spot, my knee positioned on a very uncomfortable rock. I repositioned myself so I was sitting again, staring at the sand.

"Sorry," I sad quietly. "One of those irresistible urges, you know? It's not everyday you can find out the identity to one of Gotham's most famed heroes." I looked at him as he stood. His face was covered again, and I assumed he'd found his mask. Or he carried a spare. I allowed myself a small chuckle at this as I wondered where he would keep one. He walked over, helping me back onto my feet.

"I'll take you home."

* * *

Thanks ever so much for reading!


	10. Corynorhinus

* * *

Ugh. I am not at ALL happy with the way this chapter turned out. Bruce and Alfred seem OOC to me, and everything's a little jumpy around the middle when Michelle comes back in. Not to mention it's way short.

My deepest and most sincere apologies, loyal alerters. The next chapter will be better.

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Batman, or any works relating to such. I take sole ownership of Evelyn, Michelle and Isaac.

* * *

The soft humming and the smooth ride of the Batmobile lulled me into a faux slumber as Batman drove me home. I'm not sure how many times I dozed off, but one moment we were still driving, then the next he was lifting me out of my seat. After lying me on a table in what I assumed to be the Batcave, he vanished for several minutes. I dozed off again, because he had to shake me a little to wake me up.

"I'm going to give you a sedative," he said in a low voice. I didn't complain, because I really just wanted to go back to sleep. I barely felt him inject the syringe into my arm, but I knew he had because moments later I was thrown into blissful darkness.

* * *

Bruce removed his mask, setting it on the table next to him. He gathered Evelyn into his arms and headed back for the elevator. Alfred met him by the piano.

"How is she, sir?" he asked as Bruce walked past him, heading for Evelyn's room.

"Uninjured," he answered.

"And you, sir?"

Bruce didn't answer as he pushed open the room's door. He gently deposited her onto the bed, brining the cover up around her neck. He ran his gloved hand across her forehead and pushed several locks of her scarlet hair out of her face.

"She has to leave, Alfred," said the billionaire as he exited the room, shutting the door behind him.

"Excuse me, sir?" Alfred asked, genuinely shocked.

"She has to leave," Bruce repeated, heading back for the Batcave to change out of his Batsuit. "It's too dangerous now. Evelyn can't stay here any longer; you know that."

"I do, Master Wayne," began the butler, "but I'm certain if you just-" Bruce interjected.

"There's nothing I can do, Alfred," he asseverated. "I can't let her stay at Wayne Manor when Joker knows she's living here. She can't know I'm Batman because that would put her in even more danger. The only solution is to have her leave. Arrange her a flight to Ireland. Her parents live there." He pulled off the remainder of his suit, throwing it onto the ground. Alfred sighed dispiritedly.

"Yes, sir," he said. "Though there is one thing I'm not sure I quite understand."

"And what would that be, Alfred?" questioned Bruce as he jerked a black tee-shirt over his head.

"If you care about Miss Larrabee as much as you let on," he began, "then why are you so insistent on making her leave?" Bruce sighed, sitting down hard on a chair.

"It's _because _I care about her, Alfred," he said, resting his head on his hands. "It's because I care about her that she has to leave. She's in too much danger here, and I can't…I _won't _let her life be threatened like that again." Alfred was silent for several moments before he turned.

"I'll arrange the flight, sir," he said as he reentered the elevator.

* * *

I can say I was more than shocked when Alfred told me the next morning that my parents had called, wanting me to come visit them for a month or more. My parents hadn't wanted me to visit since two years ago, on my grandmother's eighty-fifth birthday, and that had gone terribly wrong when my uncle Ripley had had a seizure after my aunt's kids had set off fire-crackers.

"Everything's been arranged, miss," Alfred told me from the doorway of my room. I was so aghast that my mouth was beginning to dry from being hung open so long. I finally shut it, my mind still tumbling over thoughts as to _why _my parent's wanted me to visit.

"When do I leave?" I managed to ask as I pulled myself out of bed, throwing the comforter onto the floor.

"This afternoon, miss. You should be in Ireland by seven tomorrow morning," Alfred replied. I nearly tripped over my own feet as I stumbled to a stop.

"This afternoon?!" I said. "What am I supposed to tell Michelle? Oh shit, I should call Michelle!!" I ran to my pants from yesterday, digging in the pocket to find my cell phone.

"I know it's all incredibly sudden, miss," Alfred was saying as I punched in Michelle's number. "But your parents seemed insistent that you visit. I believe you could do with a vacation away from Gotham, after last night's escapade." As I waited for Michelle to pick up her phone, I recounted the previous night's events. Something struck me suddenly, and I had just turned to ask Alfred about it when my best friend answered.

"Eve!" was her first word. "Where in the world have you been?! I haven't been able to get a hold of your apartment for ages! I even tried your cell phone and you didn't pick up!! I was so worried about you!!"

"I'm staying with Wayne," I said as casually as I could. I could hear her stifled gasp on the other end of the phone.

"_Bruce _Wayne?" she said in awe.

"The one and only," I replied, pulling out a pair of khaki cargos and one of Isaac's old shirts from the closet to wear. "Come up to the mansion and I'll explain _everything._"

"Oh, you'd better!" Michelle said, giggling. Then she hung up and I turned back to Alfred. He had disappeared during my phone call. I dressed quickly, then rushed downstairs to find him before my scatterbrain made me forget my question.

How did a certain masked vigilante know who I was? More importantly, know where I lived?

* * *

I skipped down the stairs, two at a time, my sore knee feeling much better, and skidded into the foyer, heading for the noises in the kitchen.

"Alfred?" I called as I opened the door. "Oh."

"I heard your parents called," Bruce said from where he stood, stirring his mug of coffee. I nodded.

"I was looking for Alfred," I said, folding my arms across my chest, "but you must know, too."

"Know what?"

"How exactly Batman knew who I was, where I was being held captive, and where I was staying. I know I didn't sleepwalk from his Batcave back to here."

"How am I supposed to know that?" Bruce asked as he walked past me and into the foyer.

"Well weren't you here when he brought me back? Aren't you the one who called him to come and save me? Didn't you talk to him _at all?_"

"I was here, but he didn't come inside. In fact," Bruce paused to think. "I didn't even see him. And I called the police, not him, to rescue you." I was about to add more when the doorbell rang.

"She must've drove like a demon to get here so quickly," I said quietly, turning and rushing back toward the door. I swung it open and was immediately latched onto by my chestnut haired friend.

"I'm so glad you're okay, Eve!" she cried, releasing me. "You have, have, _have _to tell me _everything _that's happened!" She stopped short, looking past me at Bruce. "I can't believe I'm actually in his _house_!" she whispered to me in sheer awe.

"This way," I said, giving the billionaire a quick smile before I trudged upstairs, Michelle right behind me. I pulled her into my room, shutting the door. She instantly bombarded me with questions.

"How did you get out of jail? Why are you staying with Wayne? Did he bail you out? Why? I mean, he's not the type! Oh! Are you two having a-…"

"Michelle, Michelle!" I said, holding up my hands against her words. "Slow down! I can't answer all of that at once!" She burst into a fit of giggles, covering her mouth with her hands. I waited for her to calm, then folded my arms across my chest.

"Sorry, Eve, sorry," she said, pushing a strand of curly brown hair behind her ear. "Seriously! How did you get out of jail? I mean, they had you on attempted _murder _charges!" I sighed in frustration.

"False charges!" I said, throwing my hands in the air. "I didn't shoot Mister Earle!"

"Then how'd you get out?" Michelle asked, eyes wide in anticipation.

"Guess," was all I said. She sat in thought for a moment, brushing her fingers against her lips languidly. Her head snapped up suddenly.

"Eve, you didn't!" she said, aghast. I nodded, grinning.

I've known Michelle since middle school, and we've never had secrets. Ever. So of course I knew I could trust her with my biggest secret of all.

"I used alchemy."

* * *

Thanks for reading! 8D


	11. Antrozous

Sorry for such a slow update XD School sneaked up on me and I was only a quarter of the way through this chapter XD Anywho, this particular chapter delves somewhat into Evelyn's past, and how she became an alchemist (albeit not a very good one).

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Batman Begins or The Dark Knight or any other Batman reference I might have made somewhere along the lines of this story. I solely own Evelyn, Michelle, Charlotte and Greg.

* * *

"Trial and error, my dear," my 'aunt' Charlotte said, pushing her goggles off her eyes and onto her forehead. "Alchemy is a science, and science is based off the foundation of trial and error." I pulled my own goggles down around my neck, sighing.

"I know," I replied. "But you'd think after thirty times, I'd get the damn thing right!" I kicked the pile of debris angrily, causing some bits to fly off.

"I think we should stop…," Charlotte mused. I frowned, then stooped and gathered everything back into the pile.

"No," I said. "Let's keep at it. No way to get better unless I practice, right?" I kneeled by the pile, redrawing my transmutation circle in front of it.

"There should be one more line there," Charlotte said, pointing with a gloved finger. I added it in, then pushed my goggles back up over my eyes. I looked back over at Charlotte, who nodded. "Concentration," she said, smiling. I nodded, then turned back to the pile. I closed my eyes behind my goggles and took in a deep breath. I released it, then opened my eyes, placing my hands on the edge of the circle lightly. I concentrated all of my energy through my fingertips and into my alchemy. A ghoulish green glow emitted softly at first, then quickly gained in brightness. Its luminescent shine made me grin.

"Excellent work, Evelyn!" I heard Charlotte praise behind me as the near blinding light dimmed. Before me, where once sat the pile of rubble, was now a small replica of one of Gregory's old vases.

"Yes!" I shouted, standing up in a jump. Then my vision blurred and I passed out.

* * *

I awoke in my bed the next morning, Charlotte just entering. "You overdid it," she informed me, smiling.

"What?" I asked, sitting up slowly, propping my back against my pillows.

"That was your first successful transmutation, Evelyn. You can't just expect to have enough energy right afterward to leap in the air like an ape," she said, taking the chair from my desk and sitting down. I closed my eyes, sighing.

"I guess I just kind of got all caught in the moment," I mumbled, throwing my legs over the bed. I stood and wobbled to the door, heading for the bathroom. Charlotte smiled and followed, making her way to the kitchen. When I finally entered, fully clothed and clean, Charlotte had arranged a massive breakfast for the two of us. Pancakes were piled on top of each other, dripping with maple syrup extracted from the trees around the cabin. Bacon strips and eggs sat next to each other, steaming on their plates. A pot of tea and two mugs were in the center of the food, surrounded by small scones and sticks of butter. Fresh fruit bobbed in a large bowl of water close to the edge of the table.

"Sweet!" I cheered, taking a seat. I grabbed a plate and began to pile food onto it.

"Now that you've learned to successfully transmutate a simple object, it's time to move onto a more difficult one. That's why you get so much food this morning! Need all the energy you can get!" Charlotte said, grinning. I gulped down my mouthful of strawberries slowly.

"Great," I said sarcastically as I took a swig of tea.

* * *

"Sorry, can't work alchemy. Too full," I said as I followed Charlotte reluctantly out to the back of the cabin. She chuckled as we went through the back door.

"You have a choice today, Eve," she informed me. "Steel, wood, or glass." I knew this was a trick. She tried to make it sound like wood was the easiest choice here, as far as reconstruction. I knew better.

"Glass," I said. Charlotte grinned.

"Glass it is!" she exclaimed. From around the side of the house she brought a glass obelisk on a wheeled cart. She stopped the cart in front of me. "Bend it."

"What?!" I shouted. Her grin only widened.

"You thought it was going to be reconstruction, didn't you?" she asked. I didn't give her the pleasure of an answer. She didn't seem to mind, for she continued. "We're going to move onto something harder. Realigning the molecules in an object to form a different object from the starting one. It'll still be of the same material, but in a different shape. To achieve this, you need to concentrate very, very hard on the shape you want it to be. You also have to take notice of what the molecules are doing so you know whether they're expanding, contracting, or imploding on themselves. You don't want that last one."

"I can't imagine," I replied.

"So you'll be needing a slightly different transmutation circle," she said, kneeling next to me. She drew it on the ground with chalk almost effortlessly. "Study and replicate." I took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. I placed the tip of my chalk on the ground and began to draw.

"How's that?" I asked when I'd finished. Charlotte observed it a moment, then made one more line on the left hand side.

"Perfect," she said. "Now, bend the glass." I nodded and took the glass obelisk from the cart. I positioned it over my transmutation circle and kneeled back down.

"Okay…," I said slowly. I closed my eyes, envisioning the bended piece of glass in my mind. I kept it there as I placed my hands on the circle. I let the energy flow from my fingertips into the circle, and up into the glass obelisk. I could see a bright light from behind my closed eyelids and I smiled.

Then the glass shattered, and I threw my hands up to shield myself. I opened my eyes after the shards had ceased falling and huffed out an angry breath.

"It didn't work!" I observed furiously. "And I broke it!" Charlotte was just laughing, having a grand old time. "It's not funny, Charlotte!" I said, frowning.

"Oh, dear, it is! You did exactly what I did the first time I tried to bend glass!" she said. "Shattered it to smithereens!" My tutor was practically rolling on the ground now. I stood angrily and crossed my arms over my chest. Charlotte stopped laughing long enough to look up at me. One look at my serious face sent her spiraling into another fit of giggles. This time I couldn't help but join her.

"Oh, dear lord, Evelyn," Charlotte managed to say after she'd calmed down. She lifted up my chin with her hand gently. "You're bleeding! That glass must've caught you. Come. Let's get inside and make some tea and get you fixed up."

* * *

We took a break from alchemy for several days and I stayed the night with Michelle back in town. We were sitting in her room, watching _The King and I, _and it was not two minutes from the end when my cell-phone went off.

"Pause it! Pause it!" I hissed at Michelle as I fumbled to answer it. She took a dive for the remote as I flipped my phone open, not even bothering to see who it was. "Hell-oh?" she said, stressing the last syllable of the word.

"Eve? It's Charlotte," came the reply.

"Charlotte?" I asked, wondering why she was calling. I wasn't supposed to be back for another two days. "What's up?"

"A lot," she said. "I have to go back to England."

"What?" I asked. Michelle was at my elbow, trying to listen in. I batted her away. "Why? What's going on?"

"I can't say," Charlotte said. "Stay in Gotham. See if you can stay with Michelle. I'll send your things to her house." There a click and my phone read 'call ended.'

"What was all that?" Michelle asked, eyebrows raised in expectance.

"Not a clue," I said, closing my phone. "But it looks like I'm staying here for a while."

* * *

Michelle's mum didn't care if I stayed. Hell, she would've cared if I had lived with them for months on end.

Good thing, too, because that's exactly what happened.

I couldn't get a plane ticket back to Ireland, so I stayed with Michelle. I called my parents to tell them where I was, and they didn't seem to care, seeing as I was nearing my eighteenth birthday. They thanked me for calling them, and if I ever wanted to come to visit it would be fine, but they practically said that I was a free bird now and could do whatever I felt like.

So I decided to tell Michelle what I had been doing over the entire summer.

"You know how I said that I'd been at a summer school this summer, Mich?" I asked as we sat on her bed playing Black Jack one night.

"Mmhmmm," she replied. "Hit me." I gave her another card and continued.

"Well, I wasn't," I said. Her full attention was now on me.

"You weren't?" she asked. "We're you off with a boyfriend? You weren't into drugs, were you, Eve? Please say no!" She'd dropped her cards.

"Of course not!" I snapped, slightly offended by what she thought I was doing. "I was, uh, with my Aunt Charlotte. Well, she's not really my aunt," I confided. "She's more of a family friend."

"Aaaand?" Michelle prodded. "Point, please."

"My point," I said, "is that I was practicing alchemy with her."

"Alchemy?" Michelle sputtered. "Like, magic, turning lead to gold alchemy?" She tilted her head back with laughter. "You've _got_ to be on drugs to expect me to believe that! Everyone knows alchemy doesn't exist anymore!"

"You're wrong," I said, slightly affronted. "It is real."

"Oh come off it, Eve!" my best friend replied, still chuckling slightly. I closed my eyes in frustration and hopped off her bed.

"I'll show you! Give me something I can fix," I proclaimed. She too got off her bed.

"Alright," she said, bending and reaching under her bed. She withdrew several pieces of wood. "It was a present my grandmamma gave me when I was six," she informed me. "It was a tiny wooden rocking-horse that my clumsy brother broke a few years back. I tried gluing it, but the glue wouldn't hold."

"Right," I said, taking the wood from her. "Let's go out on your back porch." Michelle followed me as I tromped downstairs and out into her small backyard. I took the piece of white chalk from my pocket and began to draw on the concrete patio.

"What's that?" Michelle asked from above me.

"It's called a transmutation circle," I told her as I made another line. "It's what alchemists use to fix things."

"Suuuure," she said sarcastically, snickering behind her hand. I scooped up the wood and placed it into the center of the circle.

"You sure that's all of the pieces?" I asked, looking up at her. She nodded. "Alright," I said, looking back down. "I need you to be completely silent." I closed my eyes, envisioning the rocking horse in my head. I carefully placed my hands on the edge of the circle and felt the energy flow from my fingertips. I heard Michelle gasp as a bright green light engulfed the small pile of wood.

Once it had vanished, I opened my eyes. I picked up the rocking horse, holding it out to Michelle. "Good as new," I said, placing in her outstretched hand.

"How in blue blazes…," she began, staring down at her treasured item. She looked back up to me. "That. Was. So. Cool."

"I think I deserve an apology after that, Miss-Alchemy-Doesn't-Exist," I said, folding my arms over my chest.

"Alchemy exists," she said, grinning. "Boy, does it ever."

* * *

Hope you enjoyed!


	12. Myotis

Finally! An update! Sorry that I haven't been so Johnny-on-the-spot with my updating recently. School's swamping me, and I've been procrastinating terribly!

Disclaimer: I don't own Batman, but I claim the rights to Evelyn, Michelle, and Isaac. Mine, I say.

Right-o! On with the chapter!

* * *

Michelle was in sheer awe after my full explanation of everything that had happened from my being arrested, to now. I left out the whole being suspended over a thirty-foot death dive and rescued by the dark knight that I seemed to have a love-hate relationship with. Then I told her about my parents.

"What!" she exclaimed, bouncing slightly on my bed.

"I know," I replied. "I don't even really wan-"

"Take me with you!" she interjected excitedly. I let my mouth fall open in shock, staring at her.

"What?" I was bewildered. Michelle continued on excitedly.

"Oh please, please, please, Eve! I've never been to Ireland before and this would give me a chance to take my vacation! Can I please come? Can I?" She looked at me with expectancy. I frowned slightly, eyebrows creased in slight frustration. Suddenly I grinned.

"Of course you can come, Michelle," I said. "Of course."

* * *

"Thanks for driving us, Alfred," I said as Michelle and I sat in the back of the Royce. Alfred nodded from the front, turning onto the drive that led to the airport.

"Of course, Miss Larrabee," was his response. He pulled up to the curb at the departure sign, putting the car into park. Michelle was still giddy with excitement, chattering on about everything she would do in Ireland. I half-listened as I hauled my suitcase from the trunk. "Master Wayne asked me to apologize for him not being here," Alfred said as he handed me an envelope. "Though he wanted me to give you this." I opened the envelope, revealing several hundred dollars.

"Tell him thanks for me," I said, hugging the old butler. "And that I'll miss you guys." Alfred smiled.

"Certainly, Miss Larrabee. I'm sure Master Wayne will miss your company, though he'll never admit it," he said. I waved as Michelle and I headed into the airport, then turned and walked toward the departure desk. I picked up our tickets, then headed for Gate A. Once there, I turned to Michelle.

"Here," I said, handing her a ticket. "Tell my parents hi for me, okay?" She began to nod as she put the ticket in her pocket, then her head snapped up at me in shock.

"What?" she asked. "You can tell them yourself, can't you?" I shook my head.

"I'm not going," I said. I handed her my ticket as well. "You are."

"Why aren't you, Eve!?" she almost shouted. "I thought your parents called! They want _you_ to come!"

"I can't, Michelle," I implored. "I have to stay here. I still have things I need to do."

"Like what?" She stared at me, eyebrows creased together.

"I made a promise to myself," I said slowly. "One that I intend to keep." An announcement came over the intercom suddenly, declaring that the flight to Ireland would be leaving soon. I grabbed Michelle's shoulder gently. "Just trust me," I said. "You'll have a great time in Ireland, and I'll see you in a few weeks, okay?" She frowned. I stared at her.

"Okay," she said quietly. "Just be careful, Eve." I grinned.

"Careful is my middle name!" I said. Michelle smiled, then picked up her suitcase and headed for the gate. I waved until she disappeared around the corner, then I grabbed my own suitcase and headed out of the airport.

* * *

"She should be on the flight by now, sir," Alfred informed Bruce as they walked down the hall toward the study.

"Good," was the billionaire's response. He tapped the keys on the piano, then they both stepped onto the elevator and descended to the Batcave. He walked over to his computer, bringing the Joker's face up on the screen. "I have to find him, Alfred," he said slowly. The butler nodded.

"Shall I prepare your supper now, sir?" he asked as he followed Bruce into a different part of the cave.

"That won't be necessary," Bruce replied, pressing a button on a small console, opening the cabinet that held his Batsuit. Alfred let loose a small sigh.

"Very well, sir," he said, then turned and headed back toward the elevator.

I checked into a hotel with the money Bruce had given me. As I headed for my suite, I began to formulate a plan in my head as to how I was going to find Joker and exact my revenge. Unlike last time, I would be completely prepared. I slid the keycard into the slot and entered my room, heaving my suitcase onto the bed and unzipping it. Laying on top of everything else was my Theatric Phantom uniform. I picked it up, staring at it for several moments before I set it on the pillows and began to undress.

I came across my first problem very quickly. The window to my suite didn't have anything I could climb down on. I looked over the sill at the street below, then, sighing in frustration, pulled my head back inside the suite. I walked to my suitcase that was still on my bed and pulled out a button up blouse. "This is ridiculous," I said as I pulled the shirt and a pair of slacks on over my costume. I shoved my mask in my pocket then headed out of my suite, making sure I had my keycard safely tucked into my boot, right next to my chalk.

I ducked into an alleyway several blocks down and clambered up the fire escape to the roof. There I shed my blouse and slacks, stuffing them in one corner of the rooftop. I placed my mask back on my face and stretched my arms above my head. "Alright," I said to myself as I headed for the edge of the roof. "If I were Joker, where would I hide?" I looked down at the mostly deserted street, contemplating. "Well, I guess I just start searching!" I said finally. I headed for the other end of the roof, sprinting the last half and jumping across to the next building. I landed, rolling a couple times, then stood.

I only jumped this time, instead of shrieking, as he loomed above me in the moonlight. "I'm getting used to running into you like this," I told the caped crusader casually.

"Why are you still here?" he asked after several seconds of silence. I blinked.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Why are you still in Gotham?" he asked, stepping toward me. I frowned.

"Last time I checked I lived here," I replied, staring up at his masked face. Something clicked in my mind just then. Why was I being asked by the Dark Knight why I was still in the city I lived in? He knows perfectly good and well that I live in Gotham, so why?

Unless he knew I was supposed to be on a plane to Ireland. But the only people who knew that- besides Michelle and my parents- were Alfred and…

"Bruce?" I asked quietly, eyes widening beneath my domino mask. His own eyes closed, and we just stood there for a few moments, neither of us moving. He acted first.

"Come with me," he said, then turned and headed for the roof's edge. I stared after him for several seconds, no following until he'd leapt off of the roof. I sprinted to the edge and looked over, seeing the Batmobile on the deserted street below. Batman was standing next to it, and I flung my leg over the side and proceeded down the fire escape. I jumped the last few rungs of the ladder, landing on the ground with a quiet thud. I walked slowly to the vehicle. "Get in," said the Kevlar-clad hero. The top of the Batmobile slid back, and I climbed over the side, into the passenger's seat. He climbed in beside me, closed the top, and brought the monstrous machine to life. We drove toward Wayne Manor in silence, the only sound that of the Batmobile.

"You didn't trust me enough," I said matter-of-factly after several unnerving minutes of silence. I heard him sigh beside me.

"It wasn't that," he said.

"Then what was it?" I looked over at him, awaiting his answer. He didn't say a single word until we'd reached the service road that led to the Batcave.

"Hold on," he said as he flipped open one side of the joystick on the center console. I blinked, about to ask why, when he pressed the small red button and the jets on the back of the vehicle ignited, sending us soaring through the waterfall and into the Batcave. My breath caught in my throat as he did, and I let loose a huge sigh when we came to a stop. He opened the top of the Batmobile and got out. I followed suit, then trailed after him as he walked away from me.

"You never answered," I said. He stopped, his back still toward me. He pulled his cowl off and ran a gloved hand through his hair.

"I couldn't tell you," he said quietly, still not facing me. "I couldn't tell you because I didn't want to put you in that kind of danger."

"Bruce…," I said, placing my hand on his arm. He turned then, and I looked up into his unmasked face. I took a step forward, closing the distance between us to only inches. I bit my lower lip, then raised myself to my tiptoes, my lips centimeters away from his. I placed my hand on his shoulder, and he moved his to the back of my head and our lips met in an ardent kiss. He pulled away slowly after several seconds.

"I can't," he said quietly. I took a small step back.

"Why not?" I asked. "Is there some-"

"There's no one else," he said, cutting me off. "There shouldn't even be you." He sighed, frustrated, and looked down at his feet, rubbing his eyes with one hand.

"What do you mean 'shouldn't even be me?'" I asked stubbornly.

"You'd be in too much danger," Bruce replied, looking up. "Evelyn. Please."

"So what?" I asked. "I can take care of myself!"

"You call getting yourself kidnapped by Joker 'taking care of yourself?'" he asked. I stared at him hotly, still frowning. Bruce placed his hands on my shoulders. "Evelyn, you have to listen to me. I don't want you in that kind of danger again, and if any one of the criminals in this town found out that we were together, they could use either one of us as leverage against the other." He closed his eyes for a moment, sighing, then opened them once more. "You have to understand that we just _can't_."

"Oh. Oh, I understand," I replied bitterly. "I'll just go to Ireland, I guess, since you don't seem to want me here."

"Evelyn, don't," he said. "You're putting me in an impossible position. You're being unfair."

"Me? _I'm _being unfair?" I asked, scoffing slightly. "You're the one who kept everything a secret! You didn't tell me anything! Then you just send me off to Ireland without a word! You didn't even come to the airport!"

"I _couldn't _tell you, Evelyn," Bruce insisted. "You would have been in too much danger that way." I was about to retort when someone behind Bruce cleared their throat.

"If I may interrupt, Master Wayne," Alfred said. Bruce turned, and I stepped to the side to look at the old butler. "I figured it would be wise to tell you that the computer has picked up on the Joker's location. Clearly you couldn't hear it over your bickering."

"What?" I asked as Bruce headed back toward the computer room. I followed him, and Alfred followed me.

"It's nice to have you back, Miss Larrabee," he said, smiling. I half returned his smile as we stopped to stand behind Bruce.

"I'm going after him," he said, turning and pulling his cowl back over his head.

"And I'm coming," I said. Bruce, who had just taken a step toward the Batmobile, turned back to me.

"No," he said.

"I'm not a kid, Bruce," I said firmly, walking past him and toward the Batmobile. I turned back to him when I reached it. "I'm coming." Not saying a word, he slid the top open and climbed in, me following.

"Be careful, sir," I heard Alfred say before the top closed. We roared out of the Batcave and onto the service road, neither of us saying anything.

"You leave Joker to me," Bruce said in a low voice. I nearly replied with 'no way', but bit my lip and remained quiet. There was no way I was letting Bruce get to him first, though. I would get my revenge on Gotham's clown for killing Isaac, no matter what the caped crusader says.

* * *

Thanks for reading~


	13. Always a Catch

Sorry for such a long wait. I had a lot of trouble deciding what would happen in this chapter.

I've also used all the names from the Batman Begins soundtrack for my chapter titles, so I'm going to move on to titles from The Dark Knight soundtrack :D

Disclaimer: I don't own Batman, or any other Batman-related trandmarks/whatever I used in this. I claim Evelyn, Michelle and Robert, and my other characters that have been mentioned in previous chapters.

* * *

"Something's…not right," I said after a moment of complete silence. I looked over to Bruce. "Don't you think? I mean, it's entirely way too quiet, am I right?"

"Unless he-"

"-wants us to think that he's not here," I finished for him. He cast a sideways glance at me. "What? Isn't that what the bad guys do? Pretend they're not home until the hero leaves, thinking they're really not there?" He continued to stare at me. _"What?_ I watched a lot of action movies when I was younger. These sort of things always happen in action movies."

"Joker's not exactly one to be predictable," Bruce said. "Let's check it out." He opened the top of the Batmobile. In one swift movement he'd leapt out, landing fluidly on the asphalt. I watched him from my seat until he was practically across the street, then I too leapt out, almost tripping, and hurried after him. He was at the side door of the warehouse that opened into the alleyway. I moved to stand behind him.

"Shouldn't we try the roof?" I asked, pointing up. He ignored me as he took out his lock-picking kit. I sighed, resigning myself to surveillance, and making sure that we weren't being watched by anyone. I scanned the alley, the building's face that was opposite us, and the outside wall of the warehouse. My gaze stopped on a small, flashing red light. I blinked, cocking my head at it.

A camera?

No, wait. Not a camera.

"A bomb!" I exclaimed just as Bruce pushed the door open.

My best guess was that Joker hadn't felt it sufficient enough to have bombs planted inside the warehouse, but outside as well. I assumed that he had rigged up some sort of spring-loaded mechanism that would cause the bombs to go off when the door was opened. He must have done it on every door because he couldn't have known what one Batman would choose. That meant there were a helluva lot of bombs in that warehouse. And when the door had been pushed open, setting off one, the others quickly followed.

I think that getting blown backward once through cement and sheetrock really deters one from ever wanting to experience such a thing a second time. I sure don't want to do it again.

The only thing I really saw before flames dominated my vision was Bruce turning to, well, I don't frankly know what he intended to do. He certainly couldn't have stopped the explosion, or stopped me from going through the warehouse opposite us in the alleyway.

I blacked out for at least a minute after the explosion. It must have been after my back had broken through the cement and sheetrock, which isn't a pleasant thing to feel. I opened my eyes to darkness, and for a moment I thought that the explosion had rendered me temporarily blind. I found, however, that I was actually just facedown on the floor of the building I'd been so violently thrown in to.

My ears had popped several times over, and were now ringing, making everything sound as though I had a pair of earmuffs on. My nose was bleeding; I could taste the coppery blood as it ran down my throat from my nasal cavity. It was pooling beneath my face as well, causing part of my cheek to itch terribly.

The next thing I did-- try to move-- was a mistake. That's putting it lightly. As soon as I shifted my position beneath whatever had pinned me to the floor was like setting off an H-bomb in my chest and spinal chord. I couldn't quite cry out as my back and chest both erupted in pain, but I managed a choked little whimper. My chest burned at the mere thought of breathing deeply; I figured I had four or five broken ribs.

_Just peachy _I thought angrily, tears brimming in my eyes. Partially from pain, but mostly from anger. As my hearing started to clear, I was able to make out the distinct sound of sirens in the distance. _That explosion must have gotten their attention _I thought sourly. _That means they'll be here soon, which means I shouldn't be. _I took a deep breath, trying desperately to ignore the pain that reignited in my chest, and pushed myself up onto one elbow, pushing whatever debris had buried me off. I used my other arm to fling the rest of the pieces of the warehouse off of my legs.

Before I could comprehend what had happened, I was enveloped in what appeared to be a shadow of pitch blackness as Bruce came quickly to my side. He seemed completely unscathed. Then again, he did have Kevlar. What did I have? _Oh, right. Absolutely nothing_ I thought. I figured the explosion didn't affect him much.

"So much for catching Joker," I said, then coughed, spitting blood and mucus onto the ground.

"Can you walk?" asked Bruce from above me. I shook my head. I knew that walking--or any other heavy exertion on my part-- was a bad idea when you had broken ribs, among the other various injuries I had sustained. I winced as he swept me up into his arms, but didn't give any audible intonation that my ribs felt like a wishbone that two eight years olds were jerking apart.

"I'd say that went well," I said sarcastically as he made his way through the debris, heading quickly toward the Batmobile.

"You shouldn't talk," he told me as the top to the monstrous vehicle slid back. He set me gently into the passenger's seat, as if I were a vase that would break if set down too hard on a countertop.

"Take it easy on the corners," I replied as he took his place in the driver's seat. The roof slid closed, and he brought the Batmobile to life, roaring down the street and back toward Wayne Manor.

* * *

"Six."

I almost couldn't believe what Alfred had told me; I had to repeat it. "I have _six _broken ribs?" He nodded, pulling off his now bloodied latex gloves. I was unconscious for most of the time that my injuries had been being treated by the gracious old butler, and what I awake to is the fact that I have six broken ribs, a fractured ulna, several puncture wounds on various parts of me, and an infinite amount of bruises.

"It's a wonder you're conscious this early, Miss Larrabee," said Alfred sincerely, drawing me from my scrambled thoughts.

"I'm a fast healer," I said, which was a lie. It takes at least a month for a bruise to completely disappear on me. And that's a small bruise. Alfred apparently didn't believe me, because he gave me a look that said 'you're-not-going-anywhere-for-a-while.' I decided it would be wise to change the subject. "Where's Bruce?" I asked.

"At Wayne Tower, miss," Alfred said. "He's talking with Lucius to see what can be done about your…tattered outfit." I frowned.

"Tattered is an understatement, isn't it?" I asked, mostly as a rhetorical question. "Wait. Lucius? As in Fox? As in the same Lucius Fox from the Tower?" Alfred nodded.

"The one and the same, Miss Larrabee," he said. I stared at him, my jaw slack. "Lucius is the one that has assisted Master Wayne in the development of his equipment."

"Surprisingly enough, that doesn't surprise me," I said after a moment. I licked my lips to moisten them and smacked them together, then pressed them into a thin line. "So Bruce went down to the Tower."

"That he did, miss," Alfred said.

"How long do you think it'd take to make me a new outfit?"

"I'm not sure."

"Do you think that it'd be done by the time I can go out again?" I smiled hopefully.

"I honestly am not sure, Miss Larrabee," Alfred replied. "You'll be bedridden for at least six weeks while your ribs heal." My hopeful smile quickly turned into a frown.

"Six. Weeks," I said slowly. I cupped both hands around my forehead, then shook my head in disbelief. "Michelle will be back before then! What am I going to tell her about my six broken ribs?" I looked up at Alfred, dropping my hands into my lap. "I can see it now. She'll get back, I'll still be bedridden. She'll come in, freak out completely and ask what happened. What do I tell her? 'Oh, Michelle, it's nothing big. I just almost died because a bomb, well, several _dozen _bombs went off right in front of me. But I'm fine, honest! Only six broken ribs and a fractured ulna!' She would faint! Or worse, she'd have a heart-attack! There is no way I can be bedridden when she-" My phone began to ring, and the annoying tune it played (Rick Astley's _Never Gonna Give You Up_) could only signify one person calling.

Michelle.

I took a deep breath and flipped my phone open.

"Eve, hi!" came Michelle's voice once I'd said hello. "You'll never guess what happened after you left the airport!"

"I can't imagine, Michelle," I said, but she barely heard me because she hadn't even paused in her talking.

"-and I ran into Robert! _He _was going to Ireland for a business meeting with a couple of his colleagues! I'm staying with him in his hotel room now."

"You talked to my parents, right?" I asked. I could picture Michelle nodding furiously.

"Yes ma'am. I told them that you were sick, and couldn't fly out, but you send your love," she said. I sighed in relief.

"Thanks, Michelle," I told her.

"So what've you been up to, Eve? Anything between you and Bruce?" She practically sang his name. I thought back to the explosion, and back farther to our little display of affection.

"Nothing much," I lied. I couldn't let her know that I knew who Batman was, and that I was sitting in his manor at the moment. "I've been kicking ass and taking names and trying to avoid the Dark Knight that I seem to run into a lot."

"I think, Eve," Michelle began, but never finished. "Oh! Robert's back! Gotta go!" The line went dead, and I sighed, flipping my phone closed.

"How are things with Miss Blaine?" Alfred asked. He'd stood in the same spot for the duration of my call. "And your parents?"

"They're great," I said flatly. "I just really hope I can move around before Michelle gets back."

* * *

"We could make it like your suit," Lucius offered, pulling out blueprints of Bruce's Batsuit. "With the titanium tri-weave fibers and Kevlar. Easy to move in." He pointed with his pen to the separate plates of the suit. "Unfortunately, also like your suit, the plate separation will make her more susceptible to gunfire and knives."

"Right," Bruce said. "These sorts of things can never be easy, can they?" Lucius gave a small chuckle.

"No, I suppose not, Mister Wayne," he said. "I'll start drawing up the blueprints." Bruce nodded, then turned and headed back toward the elevator.

* * *

"I get a new outfit?" I asked. Bruce nodded as he sat at the foot of my bed. "A _real _crime-fighting outfit?" I got another nod, and a small smile. I felt so giddy, like the kid who finds that first Easter egg during the hunt. My face went red with excitement, and I grinned.

"Lucius is working on the blueprints," Bruce informed me. "He should have them done within the week." He paused. "Alfred told me you won't be moving any time soon." I huffed out an angry breath.

"Unfortunately," I hissed, folding my arms across my chest carefully. "Well, technically I'm just not supposed to go out and fight. I can probably make my way around the manor." I gave Bruce the most sugar-coated smile I could. The type of smile that said 'You-bet-your-ass-I-won't-be-lying-in-bed-for-six-weeks.'

"If you decide to do something drastic and end up hurting yourself more," Bruce began. "you'll be stuck in bed for longer." My smile vanished.

"I know," I said, letting my hands fall into my lap. "This bites." Bruce stood, putting his hand carefully on top of mine.

"You're going to have to take it easy, Evelyn," he said. "You're lucky to even be alive." I half-expected him to kiss me, and my face flushed red again. Instead he just gave my hand a squeeze, then left, pulling the door closed behind him. I let out the breath that I'd been holding, and looked at the door. I gave a sigh, then laid back on my pillows and proceeded to stare at the ceiling.

* * *

Thanks for reading~


	14. I'm Not a Hero

So, I pretty much fail at updating.

Disclaimer: Don't own Batman or any of that jazz. I own Evelyn, Michelle, Robert, Sinéad and Liam.

* * *

The only thing worse than having six broken ribs and having to be bedridden for another two weeks, is having six broken ribs, being bedridden for two more weeks, and having your best friend bring her fiancée and your parents to see you. Talk about the reunion from hell.

I had been hobbling my way down the corridor, heading toward the kitchen to scrounge up some sort of fruity delight, when I heard the voice I hadn't expected for three more weeks at the latest.

"Oh, well if she's sleeping we can just come back later." Michelle's voice floated up the stairs as I reached the top of the grand staircase. I blanched as I saw everyone who had accompanied my best friend to Wayne Manor, and I nearly fainted and fell down the stairs. My mother saw me first, and gave me a wave, which brought everyone else's eyes up to lock on me.

"Eve!" Michelle exclaimed, sprinting up the stairs, taking them two at a time to reach me.

"Careful!" I said quickly, holding out my arms as a defense as she attempted a near tackle-hug. "I, uh, have, well…six broken ribs at the moment."

"What?!" Michelle's jaw dropped. "How did you manage that?" I gave a sigh.

"Follow me," I said as I carefully went down the stairs.

"Good to see you, kiddo," my dad said, his Irish accent so thick that it was surprising anyone short of a native could understand him. He gave me a grin, adjusting the hat on his head.

"Hey, dad," I said. "Mum."

"So how'd you get six broken ribs?" Michelle asked before my mother could speak. I could have strangled my chestnut-haired friend right then and there as I watched my parent's faces take on a look of shock.

"Broken ribs?" my mother questioned in a whisper. "Evelyn!"

"I can explain everything!" I said, casting a glance at Alfred. "Over tea. Alfred?" I turned to face him.

"Certainly, Miss Larrabee," he said. "I shall brew a pot right away." He headed off into the kitchen. Michelle watched him a moment, then turned back to me.

"So, how far have you and Wayne gone?" she whispered to me, giving my side a small nudge with her elbow. I smacked her arm with the back of my hand.

"We haven't," I hissed back. "Nor do I plan to. I'm just staying with him."

"Sure you are," Michelle retorted with a sly grin. I frowned, turning to Robert.

"Control your woman," I said. He chuckled lightly, taking Michelle's hand. The door to the kitchen opened and Alfred returned to the foyer, a tray in his hands. "Come on," I said, heading past everyone and toward the parlor. "We can talk in here."

Once we'd all sat, either on the couch or in a chair, I began to talk, having fabricated a new explanation as to why I had six broken ribs. "You see," I began. "Bruce let me borrow his Mustang, and I was driving down in Gotham, right? Well, I guess with all that horsepower, I got a little careless and ended up running a red-light and bam! A Ford pickup slams right into the driver's side. Totaled the car and banged me up pretty bad too." I took a sip of my tea, waiting for it all to sink in, hoping my lie had fooled them.

"As long as you're okay," my dad said, resting his forearms on his thighs and linking his fingers together. "My Eve's a trooper." I gave a slightly nervous laugh.

"That's right," I said, smiling softly. I took another drink of my tea. "So…mum, dad. Why'd you come back with Michelle?"

"Do we need an excuse to see our only daughter?" my mother asked, dropping another sugar cube into her tea before taking a sip. "We won't be staying. I left the estate in Bernard's care, and he's too old to watch it for too long." I gave a small nod, recalling the kind groundskeeper that has worked for my family since I was a toddler, and he was old then.

"Right," I said as I stood, wincing slightly. "Well, uh, if you wait a sec, I'll go get dressed as we can do some catching up." My mother nodded, and I hurried from the room. I caught Alfred in the corridor upstairs, taking his arm. "I need you to tell Bruce that I went out with my parents for a while. If he asks why they're here, tell him that it's because Karma is kicking my ass for one reason or another." I didn't wait for his reply as I slipped past him and into my room, closing my door behind me. I quickly flung a pair of white slacks and a black blouse on, then slipped my feet into a pair of black heels. I ran a comb through my hair, then wet my hands in the sink of my own private bathroom and ran them through my hair. I hurried back into the corridor, down the stairs and into the parlor.

"All ready?" my father asked. I nodded.

"Well, Robert and I have to go get my things," Michelle said. "Before we can start the move." She gave her fiancée a big grin, then a kiss on the cheek.

"Oh, right." I'd completely forgotten that they now had plans to move in together. I sighed inwardly as I exited the parlor and headed toward the front door, my mother, father, Michelle and Robert following. "I'll be back!" I called, hoping Alfred could hear me as I opened the front door and headed onto the driveway.

* * *

"That was hell on earth," I said as I trudged back up toward Wayne Manor's front door, several hours later. My ribs ached like I'd had thirty bricks dropped on my chest, and my head was pounding with a headache that could rival California's earthquakes on a Richter scale. I grabbed the knob to turn it, only to find it was locked. I heaved a huge sigh, then pounded on the door with my fist. "Alfred!" I called. "It's me!" The door opened several moments later.

"I was beginning to wonder when you were returning, Miss Larrabee," said the old butler as I walked past him and into the manor.

"My parents are so talkative," I said with a frown. "I remember why I preferred them across an ocean. Is Bruce here?"

"In the kitchen, I do believe," Alfred said, following her. "It is almost four, Miss Larrabee. Would you care for something to eat?" I shook my head as I pushed open the kitchen door.

"Nah," I said. "We went out for dinner at Red Lobster." I stopped short in the kitchen doorway, looking around the spacious room. "He's not in here." I frowned, turning back to Alfred. He blinked.

"Perhaps he's in the garden, miss," he stated, inclining his head to the open back door. I turned back, then nodded.

"Gotcha," I said. I headed through the kitchen and to the garden. I saw Bruce cutting white roses from one of the many bushes that adorned the garden. He looked up when I came out of the manor.

"How did your family reunion go?" he asked, straightening from where he'd been crouching with his scissors. I gave a disgruntled sigh.

"Fine, I suppose," I said, sitting down on one of the wrought iron chairs next to the rose bushes. I sighed. "I can never get a word in edgewise with those two. Not to mention they think that I wrecked a car and that's why my ribs are busted, which means they probably think I'm more reckless now than I was when I still lived at home. This is just peachy." I propped my elbows on my thighs, then rested my chin in my hands. I sighed again. "Though I know if I ever told them that I was running around in a leotard, fighting criminals on the streets of the most crime-filled city in the States, they'd both have aneurisms."

"Speaking of your outfit," Bruce said, walking toward me with his basket of roses. "I have something to show you." I raised an eyebrow as I stood and followed him inside.

"Like what?" I asked.

"You'll see," Bruce replied with a sly grin. He set the basket of roses on the kitchen counter and headed into the foyer, then toward the study. I followed dutifully. He tapped several keys on the piano, opening the secret door in the china cabinet that sat at one end of the study. We both entered the elevator and it took us below Wayne Manor and into the Batcave. "Over here," Bruce said as the elevator came to a stop and we stepped off. He headed toward a large cabinet mounted on the wall. I followed him, and he opened it. I felt my mouth drop open.

Hanging inside was my new crime-fighting attire.

The design looked fairly similar to Bruce's, with the plating, though it appeared less bulky. It reminded me of a seventies era pantsuit, almost, though much more form-fitting. The plating extended down into pants, and a pair of shiny black calf-high boots sat at the bottom of the cabinet. The thing didn't have sleeves, but elbow-length black gloves. The torso part, my favorite, extended up almost like a tank-top, though the straps were much thicker and unduly more durable. A top the entire thing on a wooden head sat a sleek black domino mask. I thought it was my old one, though upon closer inspection I discovered it had small screens where the eye-holes would have been, and had similar attributes to Bruce's cowl. I stood in awe for several moments.

"Holy shit," I said finally. "It's…amazing."

"I'll be sure to tell Lucius you like it," Bruce said, smiling. I turned to face him and threw my arms around him in a hug. For a split second I felt like a little kid who'd just gotten a new bike for Christmas. I pulled away from Bruce, grinning like a complete idiot.

"Thanks," I said. "Now I wish that my ribs were fully healed so I could go kick some ass in my new outfit."

"You've still got to take it easy," Bruce said, closing the cabinet before heading back toward the elevator. I followed. "You don't want to end up breaking something else before you're completely healed."

"I know," I said as we boarded the elevator. "I've heard this spiel from Alfred about seventy times. He thinks I'm going to sneak out two weeks before I'm supposed to and end up killing myself or something." I gave a small shrug. "Though that new outfit is going to keep me from getting too banged up in the future." I smiled.

"You've got to remember, Evelyn," Bruce said as we reached the top of the elevator and exited back into the study. "There are still design flaws."

"Like the fact that there's practically nothing between the plates?" I asked. "I just won't get shot; simple as that!"

* * *

Two weeks and three days later, I was yet again on the rooftops of Gotham, now clad in my new attire. It made me feel almost invincible, though that might just be the fact that my other outfit offered zero protection. Bruce had even given me a nifty new communicator that fit inside of my ear and hooked up and around so it stayed in place.

My parents, thankfully, had left nine days ago, making me promise them that I wouldn't get into any more car accidents, and that I would visit them once in a while. I said that I'd be careful, and I'd fly over at some point. They seemed satisfied with that. Michelle and Robert have a wedding date now, and she wants me to be her best bridesmaid. I told her that I'd love to, though I'm starting to regret it slightly. Hearing her talk, the wedding is going to be huge. She told me that I'd better catch the bouquet.

At the moment, however, I was using the night vision setting in my mask for surveillance. I have to say that it's marginally easier than squinting through the darkness. "This is so cool," I said to myself with a grin. "Everything over here's clear," I said to Bruce through the communicator.

"Good," was his stoic reply. It amazed me how easily he made the transition from Bruce to Batman, then back to his playboy persona. I figured if he ever wanted to act, he'd make a damned good actor. I laughed quietly at the thought. A loud sound came from my right, and I jumped, almost falling from my perch.

"Wait a second," I said to Bruce. "Something's up." I scurried across the rooftop and peered over the edge. Directly below were two teens, probably no more than seventeen, who'd just upturned a trashcan. For a moment, I thought they were just being stupid teenagers. Then I saw that there was a homeless man on the ground before them. "No no," I said as I scaled down the fire-escape and landed quietly behind them. "Now, boys," I said, putting my hands on my hips. They turned, fists raised. "Didn't your parents ever teach you to respect your elders?"

"Back off, lady," one sneered. I rolled my eyes beneath my mask, and then lashed out at them with a low kick. The two surprised boys fell to the ground in a heap as I knocked their feet out from under them.

"Kids have zero manners these days," I said as I pulled out a long wire from the black belt that had come with my outfit. I tied them up and rolled them through the alley and onto the sidewalk. "Got two trouble-teens," I said to Bruce. "Nothing big." I went back to the homeless man and helped him to his feet. "You okay?" I asked. He gave me a toothless grin.

"Yes'm," he said. "Thank you." He shook my hand, still smiling, then sauntered off deeper into the alley. I frowned slightly.

"Uh, you're welcome?"

"Phantom," came Bruce's voice in my ear. I almost forgot that I had a codename. "Dockside. Meet me there."

"Got it," I said, then went back to the two teens. "Now," I said, kneeling next to them. "What have we learned?" They both remained stubbornly silent, and I rolled my eyes again. "Kids," I grumbled, then quickly called GCPD.

I met Bruce a top one of the many warehouses that adorned Gotham Harbor. "What's going on?" I asked quietly, looking down at the small courtyard-like area between two warehouses and several large metal storage crates. A dozen men were standing around. Two – I assumed the head honchos – were talking in the center of everyone.

"A drug deal," Bruce replied. "From the sounds of it, something that's never been on the market."

"That's never good," I said with a frown. "Why don't we just go down there and bust heads?"

"A dozen armed men, five of which have shotguns, the rest with at least two pistols each," Bruce said. "The small space would be our only advantage."

"And the element of surprise," I added.

"They're mob-bosses," Bruce said. "They're ready for anything at all times."

"Well, shit," I said. "What if we just smoke-bomb them, then jump down and kick ass and take names?"

"We need a strategy, Evelyn," Bruce said. "One that's not reckless." I frowned.

"Well, what if we sneak down there and surround them. Well, you on the right, me on left, then we just go and start taking down henchmen? Then we can go after the two boss guys," I suggested. "That could work. Plus we can just throw some weighted wire around them so the two head guys don't try and escape." I felt rather proud of myself for such a plan.

"Alright," Bruce said. "You take the left, then. Watch for my signal." He leapt off of the side of the warehouse and landed silently into the shadows below. I followed suit, though on the left-hand side, and slinked my way into the shadows of the storage crates. I used my night vision to peer across to where I figured Bruce must be, and I saw him between the warehouse and the storage crates. "Get ready," his voice sounded in my ear. I nodded, shifting my position so I could sprint forward easier.

"Ready," I said, clenching my fists.

"Now."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	15. A Little Push

I've been a bit slow lately with my updating, but school's ending soon, so chapters will be coming up more readily, I swear.

Disclaimer: I don't own Batman and yadda yadda. Evelyn, Greg, Charlotte, Isaac, Michelle and Robert, however, are my original characters.

* * *

The term "in over your head" is one that my boyfriends had used in high school to explain just how macho and amazing they were, so much so that I was "in over my head" by getting involved with them. Well, I use the term "in over my head" now, but for an infinitely different reason.

When I had suggested that we storm the drug deal, I was mildly surprised that Bruce had even agreed. Six men on either side of two mob bosses, five of which (two on one side, three on the other) had shotguns at the ready while the remaining seven with pistols. The only advantage that Bruce and I would have would be the element of surprise and the fact that the space we'd be fighting in would be small.

I was now what I liked to refer to as "in over my head."

The sneak attack was nearly flawless. Nearly. I had disarmed two of the men before the rest realized what was happening, and I was sending a kick at the third when the first sounds of gunfire shot out and echoed around the small space, bouncing off of the surrounding metal crates. I had four of the six men down, moaning on the concrete, when I found myself staring down the barrel of a 45. caliber pistol. Bruce and I had neglected to factor in the chance that the bosses themselves might have weapons, which was a mistake on both our parts. I knew I would be getting the blame- if we made it out of this, that is- because it was my idea that got us into this mess.

"Stop!" the boss shouted as I glowered at him. He cast a glance over at Bruce, who had ceased his attack, and I grabbed the man's wrist quickly and twisted. The shot rang out and both my ears began to ring as I wrenched the pistol away from the man. One of his henchmen that I had failed to incapacitate tackled me, and the gun went zinging to the side. He pinned my arms to the ground. I struggled to get my feet into a position that I could kick him off, but I didn't have to. A weighted metal chord wrapped itself around the man and he fell sideways onto the ground, giving me time to get back onto my feet.

"Phantom!" Bruce shouted as the other boss ran past me, clutching a briefcase to his chest as if it were gold Mayan coins.

"I'm on it!" I sprinted after the man, leaving Bruce to deal with the remaining men. "You're not getting away that easy," I said under my breath as I continued my chase. For a slightly overweight mob boss, he was pretty damned fast.

But I was faster.

I grabbed the tail of his suit jacket as he went to turn a corner- hoping to disappear behind the warehouse's side- and I jerked, sending the both of us tumbling to the ground. The briefcase went flying across the concrete, coming to a stop dangerously close to the water's edge.

The boss and I tussled on the ground, but once I slammed my knee into his groin he ceased his struggle. "That's more like it," I muttered, taking out a piece of wire to wrap his hands up with. I left him on the ground, still writing in pain, and walked over to the briefcase. "I got the briefcase and the boss man," I said to Bruce through my communicator.

"Good," came his near immediate reply. I sighed contentedly on a job well done, though it was almost a very bad situation, and sat down on the ground. I fiddled with the locks on the briefcase for several moments before I popped the thing open.

"Let's see what we have here," I mumbled, looking at the case's contents. What it contained was far from drugs of any variety. My eyes went wide as I sifted through the various pieces of paper and the few manila folders. "No way," I whispered.

On nearly all of the papers, someone had drawn transmutation circles.

I snapped the briefcase shut and stood, keeping one piece of paper in my hand as I stalked over to the man on the ground. "This," I spat, waving the thing in his face. "Why do you have this? What do you know?" He stared up at me.

"I don't know anything," he said. I waved the paper in his face again.

"Then why do you have this?" I asked my voice dark. He shook his head.

"I'm just transporting the thing," he said. "Don't shoot the messenger, right?" I frowned.

"Who gave this to you?" I asked. He remained stubbornly silent. I grabbed the collar of his shirt and jerked him off of the ground. "Who gave this to you?!"

"I-I don't know!" he shouted. "He wouldn't tell me! We made the exchange in the dark! He didn't want anyone to see his face!" I dropped the man and stormed back to the briefcase, picking it up. I turned to see Bruce standing only yards away.

"What happened?"

"A lot happened," I replied, walking past him. He grabbed my arm to stop me. I halted and sighed. "There's more to my past than you know," I said quietly, staring at the ground. "And it's high time you figured it out. Let's get back to the manor."

* * *

"Thanks, Alfred." I took the cup of tea from the silver tray and held it tightly in my hands, mostly to keep them from shaking. I took a deep breath. I was about to indulge Bruce in my entire life story, practically, and I didn't have any idea where to begin.

"What are these?" Alfred asked, looking down at the transmutation circles Bruce and I had spread out on the parlor's coffee table.

"They're transmutation circles," Bruce replied. "Alchemists in the pre-1600s used them in their chemical experiments. They believe that with the right reaction they could alter the very state of objects, such as turning hunks of lead into gold bars. Some of the instruments they invented, in fact, are still used by modern day chemists."

"That's the historical definition," I said, taking a drink of my tea before continuing. "There's a lot more to it than that." I set my tea on the table between two pieces of paper and began to explain.

"Alchemists weren't only chemists and scientists, they were miracle workers. It's only in history books that they never achieved turning lead into gold. My mentor, Gregory, was proof of that. He was one of the first alchemists. Nobody really knows just how alchemists came about, not even Greg did. They just kind of appeared one day.

"They're far from what you think of them today. Historians made alchemists out to be simply human scientists who conducted experiments that couldn't possibly work. They were far, far from that. They were semi-immortal, those who had discovered the Elixir of Life. Greg had, and so had Charlotte. They were well over five-hundred years old when I met them."

"Wait," Alfred interrupted. "Five-hundred? That's impossible."

"The Elixir of Life," I said. "With the correct composition of certain ingredients- herbs, raw elements, things like that- the alchemists could create an elixir that would allow them to live indefinitely. They wouldn't die from old age if they continued to take the elixir once every month. It only took a tablespoon to keep them alive forever, or for as long as they wanted." I took another drink of my tea. "Anyway, when I met Greg and Charlotte, I had no idea what I had gotten myself into.

"Greg had posed as my uncle when I was seventeen. He told me later, before he…well, he told me that he wanted me to become an alchemist because he thought I had amazing potential. Charlotte thought so, too, and they started my…apprenticeship, I guess. I didn't believe a word of what they were saying until Greg showed me alchemy using one of these." I tapped the transmutation circles on the table with my finger. "Boy was I a believer then."

"What I want to know," Bruce began, "is why a drug-dealer, a mob boss, had these in a briefcase." I shrugged slightly.

"I have no idea," I said. "Some of these I haven't even seen before. Granted, I'm just a baby in alchemist years."

"A baby?" Alfred asked. I nodded.

"Yeah. I've only been studying alchemy for seven, going on eight years. That's why I can only do small transmutations. If I tried anything bigger, I'd probably end up killing myself," I said. "Alchemy takes an enormous amount of energy in order to transmute something as small as a broken vase. Whenever I try to transmute something that's out of my league, I'm usually useless for at least a day or two afterward."

"Why do you think these are here, Evelyn?" Bruce asked after a moment, motioning toward the transmutation circles. I looked down at them.

"Well, I have a few guesses," I said. "One, someone is playing an elaborate joke on me. Two, something big is going to happen."

"Something big?" Alfred asked. "Why do you say that, miss?"

"This." I moved the papers so one was sitting on top of the others. "This is one of the most complex transmutation circles. You only ever use it if you're planning on transmuting something huge, like a building. If someone were to draw this on the side of, for example, Wayne Tower, they could bring it down faster than a hundred bombs. You see these?" I pointed to various symbols that were positioned near the center of the circle. "These are special alchemy characters. They allow alchemists to skip the reconstruction part of alchemy and just stick with the decomposition.

"You see, alchemy has certain, uh, procedures that alchemists have to go through in order to transmute something. They have to deconstruct all of the atoms that make up a certain object in order to reconstruct it into an entirely new object," I explained. "These symbols mean they can skip that second part. When that happens, whatever you're trying to transmute is completely destroyed."

"And you think someone could be planning to do that to something in Gotham?" Bruce asked.

"Well, it would certainly be a stretch," I said. "Like I said, I just have theories. I don't know why these things are here."

"You said you could do alchemy, miss," Alfred said. "Could you demonstrate?" He was excited. I could tell by the way he asked if I could show my alchemy.

"Sure," I said, standing. "Follow me!" I pulled a piece of chalk out of my pocket as I headed into the foyer. I stopped next to an ancient looking vase. "How old is this?" I asked, looking at Bruce and Alfred.

"It was Master Wayne's great-great grandfather's vase," Alfred explained. I nodded thoughtfully, then smacked the ceramic heirloom from its pedestal, sending it shattering to the floor. "Miss Larrabee!" Alfred exclaimed in shock. "You-you-you just shattered a priceless vase!" Bruce didn't look too thrilled, either.

"Just calm down," I said, kneeling down and drawing a transmutation circle on the floor of the foyer. "I did it for a reason. You're the one who said you wanted to see my alchemy." I swept all of the pieces of the vase into the circle, making sure I had them all before I knelt back down. "Watch," I said, then placed my fingertips on the outermost edges of the circle. A soft green light shimmered beneath the shattered pieces of the vase, lighting up the lines of the transmutation circle. The pile of shattered remains erupted into bright green light suddenly, and I closed my eyes as a reflex. I opened them as the light began to fade, and before me sat the vase, completely repaired and looking better than ever. I picked it up and put it back on the pedestal. "I fixed it," I announced.

"It looks…it looks as new as the day I first arrived at Wayne Manor," Alfred said slowly. I nodded.

"I can do three transmutations a day that are that simple," I said. "Any more and I pretty much pass out."

"I can see why you stick with martial arts when we're on patrol," Bruce mused. "That took a while." I nodded again.

"Like I said, I'm still a baby when it comes to alchemists," I said. "Greg could've had that fixed in less time than it would take to blink." I headed back toward the parlor. "But we still don't know why these are here," I said as Bruce entered behind me, followed by Alfred. "It doesn't make sense."

"I'll do some searching," Bruce said as he turned and walked toward the study. "Maybe I'll be able to find something."

"And it looks like I'm going to have to call Charlotte," I muttered, heaving a huge sigh and glancing over at Alfred. "We haven't talked in five years," I explained. "Not since Greg, uh, vanished, I guess."

"Vanished?" Alfred asked. I nodded and pulled out my cell phone.

"I'll explain later," I said as I punched in Charlotte's number. "That is if I survive this phone call."

* * *

Thanks for reading~


	16. Introduce a Little Anarchy

Well, on top of viruses, broken wireless cards, and absolutely no time, it's a wonder I got this next chapter up at all! But, well, here we are!

Disclaimer: Must I really go through all this again?

* * *

I had to re-dial Charlotte's number three times before she finally picked up. She answered with a breathless "Hello?"

"Hey, Charlotte," I said hesitantly. "It's Eve." There was silence on the other end of the phone for almost a full minute, and I'd begun to think she'd left me hanging.

"Well, Eve. It's been a while," she said finally, and I breathed a sigh of relief. If she was still on the phone, that meant she wanted to talk. For the time being, at least.

"Yeah," I agreed, taking my conversation into the kitchen. "Sorry I didn't call any sooner. Been…busy." I wasn't sure I'd like to indulge her in all that I've been doing since I left her cabin in Ireland to move to Gotham. "How is everything?"

"Good," Charlotte said, sounding more relaxed now. "I was trying to build a gardening shed when you called, otherwise I would have answered the first time. The transmutation took a while to complete." I heard the clinking of glasses in the background, then the sound of running water.

"Listen, Charlotte," I said, wanting to find out as much about these mystery transmutation circles as I could as quickly as I could. "I think we might have a, uh, small problem."

"What kind of problem?" Charlotte's relaxed tone had vanished entirely. "You're in Gotham, right? When is there not a problem?"

"Well, actually," I said. "The problem's more in your area of expertise." The running water stopped.

"How so?"

I paused. I couldn't very well tell her 'Oh, well, Batman and I were kicking some mob boss's ass and he was packing transmutation circles in a briefcase!' I bit my lip, trying to think of a valid excuse for me finding the circles. "I was, uh…sifting through some files in the Wayne Tower, uh, well, file cabinets and I found some--"

"Evelyn," Charlotte interrupted. "You've always been a terrible liar. Why don't you tell me what really happened?"

Damn. She was right, though. I couldn't lie when I was around her or Greg. It just wasn't possible. Something about their penetrating glares and head shaking that made me feel like a little toddler who'd just dropped the milk jug, and didn't think to pick it up before half of it was all over the kitchen. Instead of trying to fabricate another lie, I went with:

"You won't believe me, even if I did."

"I'm an alchemist, Eve. Try me."

I took a deep breath. "Okay. I'm a crime-fighter, and I was beating up a mob boss who had transmutation circles in his briefcase," I said quickly as I could, deciding it was best to leave Bruce out of this. Didn't need Charlotte knowing who Batman really was.

"What?" Charlotte asked as a teapot in the background began to whistle. "Transmutation circles? Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure!" I retorted almost angrily. "I _am_ an alchemist, too, y'know?"

"Where are you staying, Evelyn?" Charlotte asked. "I'll be there as soon as I can."

"What?!" I exclaimed. "No, no, no! Bruce would never--"

"Bruce? Bruce Wayne?" Charlotte asked. I could have kicked myself for slipping up like that, and my silence was all the answer she needed. "I guess I'm making a trip to Gotham. See you soon!" There was a click, then the dial-tone was buzzing in my ear. I heaved a sigh and flipped my phone shut.

"Fantastic," I muttered. "I call to see what she knows, and now she's on her way here." I frowned. "Better tell Bruce."

* * *

"I don't see why it's such a problem," Bruce said as he stared at the computer screen in the Cave, occasionally opening new windows that had information about alchemists in Gotham and the surrounding areas. "She can stay here."

"You're going to regret that," I said from my perch on a barstool. "Unless Charlotte's changed, that is. Where do you think I learned my 'Act first, think never' demeanor?"

"She can't possibly be that bad," Bruce replied, double-clicking on a new file. His eyes scanned the screen. "I think I've got something." I moved off of the stool to stand behind him. "This is from the Gotham Gazette that's going out tomorrow."

"'Strange circles on the sides of several government buildings in Gotham,'" I read slowly. "'These circles appeared last night on the sides of several prominent buildings in Gotham. Commissioner Gordon thinks they could be a new gang and the GCPD plans to crack down on these taggings immediately.'" I frowned. "They're going to destroy the most important buildings in Gotham if we don't do something."

"When is Charlotte supposed to be here?" Bruce asked, copying the file for his records.

"That depends on how she's getting here," I replied. "If she's flying, she'll be here too late. If she's using alchemy, she should be here within the hour."

"Alchemy? To travel?" Bruce asked, standing. I nodded.

"I never learned how it was done," I said. "But I've done it before. With Greg and Charlotte. We moved Greg's entire cabin from Ireland to Canada. It takes a lot of energy and a really complicated transmutation circle."

"Let's hope that's how she's getting here, then," Bruce said.

* * *

Twenty minutes later, my phone began to ring. "Charlotte!" I answered.

"I'm almost ready to travel," she said. "Just a few more items, and I should be on the doorstep of Wayne Manor." I grinned.

"Great. I'll see you soon, then!" I hung up and turned to Bruce. "She's on her way. She said she'd be on the doorstep of the manor in a matter of minutes, so we should probably go up to greet her." Bruce nodded, and we headed for the elevator. I explained everything to Alfred as Bruce shut the secret door in the study. "So don't be alarmed when a woman materializes out front," I said.

"I shall try to control my astonishment, Miss Larrabee," Alfred said with a small smile. As the three of us headed for the foyer, someone began knocking on the door.

"She's here!" I said excitedly, and sprinted ahead of Bruce and Alfred, skidding to a stop in front of the door. I pulled it open.

"Evelyn!" Charlotte said, setting down her duffel bag to give me a hug. "You've certainly grown up, my dear!"

"I see you haven't cut your hair," I said as I pulled out of the hug to play with her curly brown locks. "It's as beautiful as ever."

"You must be the infamous Charlotte," Bruce said as he strolled up, extending his hand for a shake. "Bruce Wayne." Charlotte bypassed his outstreched hand to give him a hug and a peck on each cheek.

"Please, dear," she said. "Infamous is such a demeaning title. You can just call me Charlotte!" She chuckled. "Or Miss Lee. Whichever you're so inclined to use." She turned back to me, suddenly serious. "About the transmutation circles, Eve…"

"Right," I said, closing the front door once Alfred had taken Charlotte's bag, only to have her take it back from him. "They're over here, but I think I know what they're going to be used for." I quickly explained the appearances on the buildings.

"Oh my," Charlotte said, frowning as she followed me into the kitchen where we'd left the circles. She set her duffel down beside the table, picking up the closest circle. Her face drained of color. "Evelyn," she said slowly. "Do you recognize this? At all?" She held up the circle.

"Of course," I said, almost indignantly. "That's the circle that allows you to skip the reconstruction step of the alchemy process." Charlotte shook her head.

"Look closer," she said. "At the bottom of the page." I took the paper from her and stared at the bottom of it. I couldn't believe I didn't notice the looping signature before.

_Gregory Pickett. _

"It's…it's Greg's," I said quietly. Charlotte nodded and I handed the paper back to her.

"Now, either someone stole this from Gregory's very private, very secured stash of circles," she said. "Or he's back from wherever he's been."

"But first, why would he be in Gotham of all places, and second, why would he be planning to destroy all those buildings?" Charlotte shook her head numbly as she put the paper back on the table.

"I couldn't tell you, Evelyn," she said, running a hand through her hair.

"Eve," Bruce said as he entered the room. "We've got a problem." I blinked.

"Uh, hold on a sec," I said to Charlotte as I followed Bruce out into the foyer. "Like what kind of problem?"

"More circles," Bruce replied. "This time on the streets themselves. It was going out over the police scanner." I blanched, my eyes going wide.

"They're not just planning to take out those buildings," I said, turning back for the kitchen. "They're going to destroy all of Gotham."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	17. Watch the World Burn

Thanks to all my alerters and favoriters! Gives me lots of inspiration when I know people like what I'm posting!

Disclaimer: Don't own Bats and all that jazz.

* * *

"We've got to get rid of those circles," I said. "Like, ten minutes ago."

"I'll go to the city and see what I can do," Bruce said, turning and heading toward the study. I followed him for a ways down the hall, explaining how to stop the transmutation.

"If you break the outer circle, even if it's just a little smudge, the transmutation won't work." He gave me a brief nod of understanding, then I spun around and went back into the kitchen. "Uh, Charlotte. We have a new problem." I relayed the information about the circles on the buildings to her quickly.

"That just doesn't make sense," she said, putting a knuckle to her lips. "Greg wouldn't do anything like this. He wouldn't kill a spider, let alone an entire city full of people. Even one as corrupt as Gotham."

"But you said that they were Greg's circles," I refuted quickly as I snatched one of the papers from the table. "His signature. You said that no one could have taken these from his collection."

"Actually, dear, I said it was unlikely that they did," Charlotte replied. "But far from impossible." She took the paper from me and set it on top of the others, then grabbed my wrist and dragged me into the foyer. "We've got to get those circles off those buildings before Gotham's reduced to a pile of rubble."

"I'm still confused," I said as I rerouted us to the garage. "Even if Greg were back, why Gotham? Like you said: he's never even killed a spider, and he freaked out when I did back when we lived together."

"Something's fishy with this entire thing," Charlotte said. "But our priority at the moment is getting those circles gone." We entered the garage, and her mouth fell open. "Being a billionaire has it's perks, I suppose."

"Yeah it does," I said as I dragged her toward the sleek silver Lamborghini Reventón, Bruce's newest addition to his collection. I figured he wouldn't mind me taking it, seeing as us getting to Gotham ASAP was our biggest priority, and seeing as the thing clocks out at just over 350mph, I thought it our best choice.

* * *

We reached Gotham in a little over three minutes, since most of the way was a straight road into the city, and I pretty much had the pedal to the floor. I thought Charlotte was going to have a heart attack right there in the passenger's seat.

"Keep your eyes peeled, Eve," Charlotte said. She was staring out the window as I drove slowly through the city streets.

"Got it," I replied, looking on the sides of buildings, trying to find the circles.

"Pull over! Eve! Quick!" Charlotte said, and I cut in front of a taxi to reach the curb. Charlotte was out of the car before I even had it off.

"Charlotte!" I shouted, shutting off the car and running after her. I suddenly felt the vulnerability of not having my suit as the wind blew through the cotton of my lavender blouse and my jeans. _I really hope nothing happens. I really hope nothing happens. _I thought as I chased Charlotte. That's when I realized she was chasing someone herself. Someone dressed in all black with a face mask, and damn, they were fast. I patted my pockets as I sprinted to catch up with Charlotte, trying to find something that could be even remotely useful. I had my cell phone and lint. "Oh, god dammit!" I said, gripping my cell phone in my hand as I reached Charlotte's side. The alley was coming to an end, and the man in black was almost to its mouth.

I hurled my cell phone.

I guess that all the training with Greg and Charlotte did some good, because my phone pegged the man on the back of the neck, and he let out a cry and face planted onto the concrete right before the alley's mouth. Charlotte and I were at his side seconds later, just as he was pushing himself up onto his hands, intent on running again. That is, until I kicked him in the side. I could feel the impact up into my hip, and whatever ridiculously hard armor that had been covering him instantly bruised the bottom of my shin. I cursed again, and Charlotte grabbed the man's arm, twisting it around his back and kneeling on it before he could even think about getting up.

"Are you the one drawing all the transmutation—OW!" The man had twisted, using his other arm to smack Charlotte off of him as he rolled. She stumbled backward into me, and we fell in a heap against the wall behind us. The man was up and gone before we could untangle ourselves and stand.

"That was a bust," I muttered, rubbing my shin. Charlotte had wandered back down the alley.

"There's a circle down here," she called, and I followed—after picking up my cell phone—to look. Charlotte spit on her hand and destroyed one entire side of it. "One down."

"A hundred to go," I muttered as I stared down at my cell phone and its cracked screen. It lit up suddenly and vibrated in my hand, and I was relieved it still worked. I answered.

"I've got the circles off the major buildings," came Bruce's voice before I could even said hello.

"We got one, too," I replied, turning away from Charlotte. "We also saw the guy who'd been drawing it. Dressed in black, with a face mask. He was going for the classic ninja look, I guess."

"You're sure?" Bruce asked, suddenly sounding super serious.

"Definitely."

"Get back to the manor," Bruce said. "Get out of the city. I know who's doing this." He disconnected before I could ask anything else.

"I don't think so," I muttered, turning back to face Charlotte as I pocketed my phone. "Let's keep looking for the circles." _He knows who's doing this, but he's not telling_ I thought as we headed back toward the Lamborghini. _I wonder why._

* * *

"That's the fourth one," Charlotte said, wiping the chalk dust from her hands. "Whatever these people are doing, they're bad at it." I looked at her, eyebrow raised.

"How so?"

"They could have had the entire city destroyed by now," she explained. "They had enough circles on enough buildings that it would be an essential domino effect. You destroy the side of one building it falls over into the one next to it, and so on. You could put circles on every other building and the entire city would be devastated, and they had more than enough time to do that." She paused, pondering a moment. "Not to mention the circles on the streets you were talking about earlier. If you set half a dozen of those off, you could take out a city block."

"So you're saying that whoever's doing this doesn't really know what they're doing?" I asked.

"Either that," Charlotte said, "or they're going for overkill. These many circles, the city would never be able to be rebuilt. There'd be no foundation. Hell, it'd probably be flooded from the rivers. If all these were activated, Gotham wouldn't only be destroyed, it'd be annihilated. It would be like dropping an atomic bomb. It would be like having a meteor the size of Rhode Island crash into Gotham. It would be like a thousand other scenarios." She looked at me gravely. "Times a thousand."

"Fantastic," I said sardonically. "Let's keep looking for—"

A bright, flashing light to our left interrupted my sentence, and Charlotte and I turned in time to see the pavement rising up like a wave, and heading straight for us. "Move!" Charlotte shouted, and she pulled me as she began to sprint away from the wave.

"Who the hell is doing a transmutation!?" I shouted as we came to the mouth of the alley we'd been in and flung ourselves around the corner, out of the path of the attack. The wave of concrete, like there was a huge subterranean creature was moving just under the surface, exploded into the street, and taxis and cars swerved to avoid the wreckage. Charlotte and I were already moving away from the alley.

"Someone doesn't like the fact we're ruining their plan, I guess," she said as we sprinted back around toward the Lamborghini.

"You think it's our ninja friend?" I asked as we rounded the corner. The Lamborghini was in sight, and then it wasn't, because it was suddenly shrouded in a bright light, and I could make out the silhouette of a man crouched beside it before it was blown sky high. The car came crashing onto the pavement with a horrendous crunching of metal and plastic. _Bruce is _not _going to be happy with me _I thought as I grabbed Charlotte by the wrist and dragged her into the pawn shop to our immediate right.

"They blew up his car!" Charlotte exclaimed as we ducked behind a row of lawnmowers, hiding in case whoever just sent 1.5 million dollars fifty feet in the air was hoping to do the same to us. "Who the hell are these people?!"

"That's what I'd like to know," I replied, peeking between the handle of one of the mowers, trying to see if anyone were outside the pawn shop. All I saw were Gothamites running to see what had happened to the Lamborghini. "We know one thing, and that's that whoever just attacked us was an alchemist, and a talented one at that. But I don't get why they haven't destroyed the buildings yet." I looked was still staring out the window. "Come on. I think we're safe."

"I don't think they're all alchemists," Charlotte said as we cautiously left the pawn shop. "Otherwise Gotham would be a pile of dust and bodies by now." We made our way opposite the still burning wreck that used to be a Lamborghini. She grabbed my shoulder suddenly, and jerked me around to face her. "A chain reaction," she said. "That's got to be it! That's why they haven't destroyed Gotham yet! Evelyn, Evelyn, Evelyn." Charlotte had a wild, excited look in her emerald eyes. "Where did the circles start showing up? What part of Gotham?"

"This part," I replied. "The Upper East Side."

"And they moved south from there, didn't they?" I thought about the buildings that Bruce had told me the circles had appeared on, and the connection clicked.

"They did!"

"Then whoever's planning this is in South Gotham," Charlotte said. "With this many circles, you could set off one, and with enough in a consecutive sequence around the city, you could set all of them off in a domino effect. That's why Gotham's still standing, and our man is in the Southern part of the city."

"Wayne Tower," I said with dawning realization. "It's the most important building in the city practically! And it's in South Gotham." I quickly pulled my phone out of my pocket and dialed Wayne Manor. "Alfred!" I exclaimed, already dragging Charlotte down the sidewalk. "Alfred! We need you to come pick us up! Right now!"

"Didn't you take the Lamborghini, Miss?"

"I'll explain everything later, but right now, I need my suit."

* * *

I managed to get Alfred to distract Charlotte long enough for me to rush to the Cave, get my suit on, and get back upstairs. I had my mask in my hand as I fixed the communicator in my ear and entered the foyer. Charlotte stared at me.

"I told you I was a crimefighter," I said simply. I switched on my communicator to Bruce's frequency. "B, we know where our guy is."

"Wayne Tower," came Bruce's immediate reply. I frowned. Somehow he always seemed to know everything before anyone else.

"Yeah," I said. "I'm on my way."

"No you're not," Bruce said. "Stay out of the city."

"I don't think so," I replied flatly. "Whoever this guy is tried to kill me and Charlotte, and hell if he's getting away with that." I pulled a Bruce, and disconnected before he could protest.

"Are we going back?" Charlotte asked.

"I'm going back," I said. "You're staying here with Alfred." I could already see the refutation forming in Charlotte's eyes. "No arguments. You don't have any protection, and I'd probably beat myself up forever if anything happened to you, Charlotte." My voice went soft. "So please, please just stay here."

"No," Charlotte said. "Like you said to whoever you were talking to: he tried to kill _us_. He's not getting off that easily. Not when I'm around."

"You're so stubborn!" She shrugged.

"Exactly. You know even if you forced me to stay, that I would find a way into the city, anyway. And then where would I be? Alone in Gotham, with no one to protect me." She looked sternly at me. "Wouldn't it be safer for me to go with you, who's protected, has weapons, and knows Gotham like she knows her own face?"

"Stubborn ass," I muttered, but knew she was implicitly right. "Let's go, then." _I just hope we're not too late._

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	18. Like a Dog Chasing Cars

A bit late. Computer troubles. Grrr.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Don't own Bats. Just Eve and Charlotte in this chapter!

* * *

"I told you to stay out of the city."

I ignored Bruce's voice in my ear as I concentrated on driving another one of Bruce's cars, this one a Ferrari. I figured I'd try not to get it blown up this time.

"I know you're listening," he said, his voice low and threatening. "And I know you're ignoring me. I know who's behind this, and I'm going to stop him." I remained quiet, biting the inside of my lower lip. "Evelyn." His tone was still threatening, but also concerned. Not enough concern for me, though, and it made me feel like I was being patronized by the headmaster at my old academy for pushing some kid in the mud then lying about it to him. He caught me, and knew I was lying, and had said my name in the same way Bruce just had.

"Then why are you so concerned with me being in the city?" I snapped suddenly. Charlotte jumped at my outburst. She didn't know I had a certain masked vigilante playing the role of my mother in my ear. "You wouldn't even tell me who was behind all this anyway! I can take care of myself so stop worrying." I yanked the communicator from my ear and threw it out the window, and smiled with satisfaction as I swore I heard it hit the gutter and bounce down into the sewer, Bruce, I imagined, still shouting at me.

"I'm guessing," Charlotte began after a moment, "that I can safely consider that a lover's spat you just had?"

"What?!" I squeaked, accidentally gunning the gas and coming dangerously close to swerving off the road at the sudden acceleration. "No! What are you talking about?!" I couldn't exactly let Charlotte catch on. She knew Bruce and I had a thing. If she thought that Batman and I had a thing, then one of two things would happen: she'd think I was two-timing little slut, or that Bruce was Batman. If she thought either, I'd rather it be the first one.

"You were talking to Batman, I assume." She stared pointedly at me.

"To assume makes and ass out of you and me." I stared pointedly ahead.

She continued to stare at me, and I could swear that her gaze was penetrating all of my defenses and looking deep into my soul. I let out a disgruntled breath.

"Yeah. I was. Happy?"

"Lover's spat," she reiterated.

"You're a troll," I said as we entered Gotham.

"So I'm right." Her statement was in no way a question, and I knew as the blood rushed to my cheeks that my comment about her being a troll had solidified her affirmations that, yes, Virginia, Batman and I had a thing.

I really hoped she thought I was a slut.

"You suck."

* * *

"Isn't he mad at you?" Charlotte asked as she rushed along beside me down the streets. I'd parked the Ferrari well away from, well, anything, just to be safe. So we were sprinting down the sidewalk, toward Wayne Tower.

"He'll get over it," I replied. _I hope._ I added mentally. Bruce wasn't the Pope, and he certainly didn't just forgive people on a whim. _He's not unlike a high school drama queen when it comes to giving the silent treatment_ I thought as Charlotte and I ran, swiping at and destroying any transmutation circles we came across.

"I hope we don't run into our little friend from earlier," Charlotte mused with a small huff.

"Don't' worry about it," I said. "I can handle him now." This was a statement that I prayed would hold true, were we to encounter our ninja friend again.

A feeling in my gut, however, told me that we wouldn't would have bigger things on our hands.

My thinking this arose from the fact that the building directly in front of Charlotte and me, not three blocks away, was engulfed in a blindingly bright yellow light that stopped the two of us in our tracks. That kind of lightning-like light exhibit could only be accomplished by experienced Vegas show technicians, or by an alchemist. A good alchemist.

"I thought your boyfriend say he had things under control!" Charlotte said, already scrambling to find her chalk.

"So did I," I muttered, reaching to my belt for my own chalk. I was starting to wish I hadn't thrown my communicator into the sewer. I really needed to talk to Bruce.

The building started to implode from the bottom, and a tremor worked its way up the sides, shattering windows and raining glass down through the dust that was forming from the crumbling foundation. Charlotte and I were already on our knees, drawing transmutation circles on the ground as fast as we could. Hers was more intricate than mine, making it more powerful, but they both had the same effect in mind: stop the building from being completely annihilated and causing a massive number of casualties.

As we touched our fingertips to the outer rims of our circles, purple and green light rose up from the chalked lines, then shot toward the building, crackling and popping like a bunch of fireworks as they danced and jumped around in an intimate and jerky performance. Our two transmutations collided with the yellow around the building, and a horrendously loud explosion- like a gun powder barrel being set on fire- filled the air all around us, and the purple, green and yellow lightning erupted into blinding white light, and I squinted my eyes as it whited out the screens on my mask. I had to look down for fear of losing my retinas, and when the light faded, I looked back at the building, a grin on my face.

The dust was dispersing quickly, and people who'd been screaming moments earlier were stopped, staring in awe at was stood before them.

Charlotte and I did the only sensible thing when something was falling. We grabbed it. In this case, with hands. Several hands. Several giant stone hands, made from the street and sidewalk below the building, had caught the edifice as it was collapsing, holding it up and nearly completely intact. Water from the pipes below the street sprayed from various places on the hands, like an odd modern art fountain, raining cold water down onto the stricken citizens, who were still trying to figure out just what had happened.

"One catastrophe averted," I said, feeling dizzy from the transmutation as I pushed myself back onto my feet. "Damn, I wish I had my communicator."

"You shouldn't have through it out the window," Charlotte said, her tone scolding, like I'd just tracked mud onto her clean linoleum.

"Yeah yeah," I replied. The sun was starting to set, and people around us were already rushing to see how they could help the people in the collapsed building. Other fine Gothamites were running away as fast as they could. "C'mon," I said to Charlotte, spinning on my heels. "Let's go find Batman." As I turned to the alley on our left, I was immediately faced with our ninja friend. At least, I figured it was him. His three other buddies, who were dressed just like him, made it hard to distinguish just which one was him. They all stood on either side of a tall grey-haired man with an equally grey beard. He was slight, and held a slim black cane in one hand, and his impeccable dress made him a bit out of place around the ninja crew.

"Who's the old guy?" Charlotte asked, taking a step closer to me and scrutinizing the man.

"No clue," I replied. "He…kind of looks familiar. Maybe. I guess. A little." I looked at Charlotte. "I have no idea who he is."

"It's you two who've been disrupting my plan, then," the old guy in question said. "A couple of little girls."

"Your plan?" The anger was immediately evident in my voice as I faced the man, and not just for the 'little girls' comment. "You're the one trying to destroy Gotham? You're the one who stole Greg's circles?" My heart was pounding in my chest and I felt like punching something, and this guy just skyrocketed to the top of my list.

"Gregory lent me his circles, actually," replied the man coolly. I clenched my fists.

"Greg would never let you have them if he knew—"

"Ah!" Charlotte grabbed my arm with her outburst, eyes wide. "I know who he is!"

"What?" I asked, looking at her, confused. She released my arm and folding her arms over one another across her chest, staring hard at the old man.

"I remember you," she said, her words clipped and terse. "You fooled Greg and me into thinking you were just another alchemist. Another Brother in our dying race." Her dark eyebrows creased and she scowled. "You're nothing but a vulture."

"I'm flattered you remember, Charlotte," the man said. I was slowly becoming thoroughly confused.

"Who the hell is this guy?" I asked quietly. Charlotte, not taking her eyes from the man, responded.

"His name is Ra's al Ghul."

* * *

Ra's isn't in enough stories, and I love him so. And he just fits so deliciously!

Thanks for reading!


	19. Why So Serious?

Sincerest apologies for the slow update. Finals testing is coming up and I've been getting a whole new slew of work from my teachers for some reason.

Only a couple chapters to go!

Disclaimer: Don't own Batman and whatnot. I own Eve, Charlotte and Greg in this chapter!

* * *

Talk about being confused. "Wait, you know this guy?" I asked, looking incredulously at Charlotte, jerking my thumb in the direction of the old fart. "How do you know this guy?"

"Charlotte and I have been acquaintances for a while, my dear," Ra's replied.

"I'd call it a parasitic relationship, you leech," Charlotte seethed. "I should've known it was you the minute the transmutation circles showed up. I knew it wasn't Greg." Her fists were clenched tight, her knuckles white. "He'd never do anything like that."

"You would be surprised as to what Gregory would do when provoked," Ra's replied coolly. I snapped my gaze back to him, face flushing.

"What did you just say?" I asked. "If you did _anything_ to hurt Greg, I swear to god you'll be a grease-spot on the asphalt when I'm done with you, you bastard." Now my fists were clenched to match Charlotte's, and I was still wishing I hadn't thrown my communicator into the gutter. "You think you can just come in here and start acting like you own the city?" I asked, a trembling anger in my voice. "You're sadly mistaken, buddy. You've got 'til I count to one to get your ninjas and get the hell outta Gotham before I kick your ass." I could see a bemused grin spread across the villain's face, and he chuckled at me, shaking his head.

"Oh, the naivety of today's youth," he said. I was flattered he thought I was a youth (not that twenty-five was old or anything) but he wasn't going to insult me by calling me naïve.

"Go ahead and laugh it up, Ra's," I growled, my hand going to my belt and the various gadgets Bruce had stored there for me. Smoke grenades, flash-bang grenades, actual grenades, shuriken, weighted cable, grappling hook, and—

A proverbial light-bulb lit up over my head as I realized I had a spare hand-held communicator on my belt. _That's it! Now I can call Bruce and tell him what's going on!_ I thought happily, momentarily forgetting that unarmed Charlotte and I were facing down four ninjas and some psycho old guy with a mustache-beard combo that made him look like a Chinese emperor. If I could just get in touch with Bruce and get him over here, then we could lock this guy up where he belonged and—

"Kill them."

I was so caught up in the realization I still had means of communication that I took my mind completely off of the situation at hand. I snapped back to reality just to fall backward to avoid the thrusting katana of one of the ninjas.

"Whoa!" I shouted, landing on my back and rolling to avoid his next attack. "Not cool!" I rolled again and sprung up onto my feet. Charlotte sprinted past me, muttering , "I hope you have a plan B."

Yeah, I hoped I did, too. At least, I hoped I could come up with one. I knew there was no way I'd be contacting Bruce with one hand and fending off a ninja with the other. Speaking of ninjas, two were in front of me, and the other two had dashed off after Charlotte. _Dammit! _I thought as I dodged another katana blow, blocking the other with my Kevlar-clad forearm. _Can't let them catch up to Charlotte. I hope she knows what she's doing._ I blocked another blow and another, constantly on the defensive, trying to keep one eye on the ninjas and my other on Charlotte. The only problem with that plan was Charlotte had disappeared, the two other ninjas with her. _Oh no_, I thought, letting my guard down for a fraction of a second as I searched for that familiar head of brown curls. A sharp pain in my arm brought me back to the fight on hand as one of the katana sliced through the suit, between the plates, on my right bicep.

"Asshole!" I shouted, ducking and rolling to the left to avoid the twin strikes thrust at me. My arm stung, but I ignored the laceration and dropped into an offensive stance, clenching my fists. _Guess Bruce'll have to wait_.

* * *

"Alfred." Bruce's voice crackled through the communicator the old butler held as he tried to monitor where Evelyn was on the Cave's supercomputer.

"Yes, sir," Alfred answered promptly. "Miss Larrabee went into the city, sir."

"I know," replied the billionaire with an air of irritation in his voice. "She threw away her communicator." Alfred felt the beginning of a headache. _Of course she did_, he thought.

"Were you yelling at her, sir?" Alfred asked politely, already starting to track the hand-held communicator's GPS from Evelyn's belt. Bruce was silent on the other end for a moment, and Alfred inferred that his charge had indeed let his irrefutable temper shine through. "She's only trying to help."

"It's too dangerous," Bruce said. "Ra's is behind the whole thing." Alfred's headache pounded just a bit harder.

"Shall I try contacting her on her belt's communicator, sir?" he suggested, already pulling up the frequency, ready to contact.

"No need," Bruce replied. "She's calling me."

* * *

One of the two ninjas was finally down. It was easy, really. I was kneeling on the ground, he had be by the throat, ready to run me through at his boss's order, I guess. What he didn't see was the transmutation circle I'd drawn in front of me, small, but effective. I told him, "You've got something on your shirt." Before he could look down and get the joke, a green light erupted and a column of asphalt shot up, snapping his elbow back the wrong way and slamming into the bottom of his chin, knocking him out and to the ground.

I scrambled to my feet and ran backward, the other ninja in pursuit. I figured this would be a good time to call Bruce, and I freed the communicator from its holder and pressed the side button. "I could use a little help!" I said in an exhale as I sprinted away from my adversary.

"Where are you?" Bruce asked as I skirted down an alley to my right, hurtling over upturned garbage cans and bags.

"A few blocks north of Wayne Tower," I panted as I sprinted over a family of rats. "You'll see us. Trust me."

"Are you hurt?"

I contemplated this for a moment, glancing back to see the ninja only yards behind me. "Not yet," I replied, then shoved the communicator back into its snug holder. _All right, Eve_, I thought as the mouth of the alley rapidly approached. _These guys think they know what you're going to do. So the best thing to do would be the unexpected. _I didn't think about how to pull something unexpected on a _ninja_ of all things, but I took improvisation classes in high school, so I had an idea. I took a smoke grenade from my belt and dropped it as I ran. It bounced, made a metallic _pink! _and then thick white smoke came out all at once, filling the alley. I heard the footsteps of my pursuer stop, and I took this chance to take out my chalk once more and draw a transmutation circle on the ground. _Last transmutation of the day_, I thought grimly as I placed my fingers on it. _Let's make it count._ The green light of my transmutation penetrated the smoke, and I could see the ninja ready to lunge, katana poised. That was, of course, before my wave of concrete upturned him, sending his weapon flying one direction, and sending him flying the other.

"Yes!" I cheered, feeling light-headed from that last transmutation. I gave an exasperated exhale, then a sharp gasp. "Charlotte!" I sprinted back through the dispersing smoke and back onto the road where Charlotte and I had parted ways. Ra's had vanished, and I rushed to the alley Charlotte had gone down. It was empty. "Charlotte!" I shouted, whipping my head around, looking for her.

"Over here!" came her voice, and my eyes shot up to the fire-escape. Apart from a bit of dust on her person, she was unscathed. She came down the ladder as I ran for her, and embraced me tight. "Bet you didn't think I had it in me to defeat ninjas," she said, releasing me with a wide grin.

"No. Not really," I said honestly.

"Thanks for that boost of confidence. I _am_ an alchemist."

"And a nuisance." We both spun to see Ra's at the mouth of the alley. "You two are becoming more of a problem than I initially thought."

"Sorry to put a kink in your plans, Ra's," I said, stepping forward, the pain from my wound ebbing into a dull throb. It wasn't bleeding too terribly, and I hadn't had time to wrap it, so I had been leaving a trail of blood droplets wherever I had been. Maybe it would make me easier to find for Bruce.

"A minor kink," Ra's replied. "Nothing that can't be dealt with."

"You don't scare me, Confucius," I said, inwardly laughing at my little joke. "Like I said earlier: get out of Gotham before I wipe the pavement with your face." _Yeah. Big words for someone who's going to pass out if she tries another transmutation, _I thought.

"You don't scare me either," Charlotte said. "You were a lousy alchemist and an even lousier cabin-mate."

"That was decades ago, Charlotte," Ra's replied, his voice low. "I think you'll find my alchemy much more up to par. Perhaps surpassing even you, my dear." Charlotte snorted, a sound I wasn't used to coming from her slim frame.

"Right," she said, voice laced with heavy sarcasm. "I've been around since before you were in diapers, Ra's. I've been around the world more times than I can count, and I've been doing alchemy since I've been able to walk. There's no way you're a better alchemist than I am." I could tell Ra's' comment had prodded at a prideful place in Charlotte's heart. She didn't even let Greg say he was a better alchemist, and he'd been doing it for longer. Hell if she was going to let this old guy tell her he was best. I could see a wolfish smile on Ra's' face, and he reached into the pocket of his slacks, withdrawing a piece of chalk.

"We shall see," he said. Charlotte fumed, her face scarlet, hand already clenched around her own chalk piece. _Great. We're about to have a battle of the alchemists,_ I thought, rolling my eyes. Then I really thought about it, and my face paled. _Oh no. We're about to have a battle of the alchemists. _Whenever Charlotte and Greg had battled with alchemy, it had been in the stretches of forest Ireland offered, and the comfort of not having anyone around to disturb you or get in your way or get hurt. Here, in Gotham, there were civilians, buildings, pets, kids. _Oh god. They can't do that here. _I grabbed Charlotte's wrist, and she jerked her head to stare at me.

"You can't be serious," I said. "There's no way you can fight here. Not in the city. Not with all these people." I gripped her wrist tight, and she cast a sideways glance at Ra's before snapping her gaze back to me. "Charlotte, we can't fight him with alchemy. We've already done who-knows how much damage to the city, and I don't think Mayor Garcia would appreciate us doing more. He hates vigilantes as much as it is." As if talking about the mayor summoned the police, sirens sounded. The GCPD had been busy enough trying to get all the transmutation circles off the streets and buildings around Gotham. I guess that collapsing building from earlier had caught their attention, finally. "We've got to get out of—" A blindingly bright yellow light lit up the alley from where Ra's had been standing, and Charlotte pushed me and screamed, "Move!"

I didn't need to be told twice and I started to sprint in the opposite direction, but the light engulfed the two of us and I couldn't see anything and I stopped running. I felt Charlotte run into my back and I grabbed her, turning my back to the transmutation and shielding her with my body. It was a good thing I did, because half-a-second later something hard—something stone—slammed into my back, propelling the two of us forward. I bit down hard as we flew out into the street at the other end of the alley, hitting the middle of the street and rolling until we hit the building opposite the alley.

"Still think it was a good idea to not hit him with alchemy?" Charlotte asked as she pushed herself up onto one hand, grimacing as several abrasions flamed up red on her exposed arms and legs. I coughed, rolling onto my back and staring up at the sky as I tried to get my head to stop spinning.

"We're onto plan C," I said, rolling onto my stomach and wincing as my chest alighted with pain. I pushed myself up onto my hands and knees, panting.

"What's plan C?" Charlotte asked, staring down the alley to see if Ra's was following us or not.

"Improvise everything," I said, pushing myself onto my feet. "I've got an idea. But I need you to be a distraction."

"I'm good at being a distraction," Charlotte said flatly and with a frown.

"That won't be necessary." I recognized that voice instantly, and I practically pirouetted an about face to see the familiar black suit with the emblazoned bat on the chest plate staring at me. In two long strides I'd pressed my cheek against Bruce's chest, hugging him around his middle, grinning. With his image to uphold, I didn't expect him to hug me back, so I released my hold and took a step back, still grinning. It faded, however, when I saw his clearly disapproving expression beneath his mask. "I told you he was dangerous," he said, his voice gruff and accusatory. I frowned, my eyes stinging with premature tears.

"I'm fine," I said, sounding as stubborn as he usually did. "Scout's honor." I just hoped Bruce didn't know I was never a Girl Scout, and that I was referring to the Indian Scouts, who were notorious liars.

"Where's Ra's?"

"Well, just follow the path of utter destruction," Charlotte said, trying to see her injuries in dim light offered by the street lamp. I couldn't even begin to imagine what time it was. _To think all this started because we thought that stupid drug deal was just that: a drug deal. Now look at where we are._ I was becoming incredibly fed-up with the entire evening, and I was pretty sure that last hit I took re-cracked some of my previously broken ribs.

"Look who decided to show up." From the alley Charlotte and I had been so recklessly flung from came Ra's' voice, and he stood on the transmuted asphalt.

"Ra's." Bruce's voice was far from jovial. I might even go so far as to say he was really pissed off about this whole thing. Without taking his eyes off Ra's, he spoke to me. "Get back to the Cave."

"And what, leave you here to deal with this loony alone?"

"Go." That was the last of our conversation, because Bruce sprang into battle with Ra's, and I lost them in the shadows of the alley. I made to go after him, but Charlotte grasped my arm to stop me.

"He said to go back to the Cave," she said. "We can have Alfred bandage you up. Bruce can handle himself." I was about to dejectedly agree when I processed what she'd said and whirled to face her.

"What did you just--?!" She cut me off with a sly grin.

"I'm not dense, Evelyn," she said. "Bruce has been gone ever since this snafu happened. Then you reappear in Wayne Manor with that—" She motioned at my outfit. "—and you expect me to think it's all some sort of weird coincidence." Her smile widened. "I wasn't born yesterday, you know."

"No, but sometimes I wish you had been," I replied. _I knew she'd find out. Dammit! _

"Let's get you back," she said, starting to pull me toward where we'd parked the Ferrari (wherever that was). I started to let her drag me, when an idea sparked in my head.

"I've got an idea," I said, jerking my arm out of her grasp.

"No. No no no no no. We're getting you home. Now." She reached for my arm again, but I was already off in the direction Bruce and Ra's had gone. "Eve! Eve, what are you thinking?"

"I've got a plan!" I said, jumping up onto the transmuted asphalt. _I just hope I can pull off one more transmutation_.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	20. A Dark Knight

Could it be?

IT IS.

This is the final chapter of _Never Met a Girl Like You Before. _

So, everyone knows what that means, right? Yes, a possible sequel! Possibly, maybe, if I'm so inclined. Which I do belive I probably will be.

Disclaimer: I don't own Batman, so no suing. Evelyn, Charlotte, Michelle and Greg are all my original characters.

* * *

"Evelyn! Get back here!"

I ignored Charlotte as I made my way over the transmuted asphalt Ra's had constructed. I wasn't going to let Bruce go after that crazy old guy alone, especially if Ra's was as good an alchemist as I thought he was. Sure, Bruce was a pro in hand-to-hand combat, hell, better than a pro. He could have ten guys incapacitated before they could even pull out their switchblades and fight back. But if Ra's moved far enough away to use alchemy, Bruce wouldn't be able to get out of the way in time.

"Evelyn!" Charlotte was climbing over the asphalt after me.

I knew how to stop Ra's; I knew I was going to have to use alchemy; I knew it could kill me; I knew that death was a risk I was willing to take if it would save Gotham. If it would save Bruce. Charlotte finally caught up to me and she grabbed my belt and I was jerked to a violent stop.

"What are you thinking?!" she shouted.

"I know how to stop Ra's," I said, grabbing Charlotte by the shoulders and shaking her lightly. "But I really need your help this time. I really need you to be a distraction."

"Bruce has got it covered, Evelyn," Charlotte said, sighing heavily. "He can handle it. He told us to go home. Besides, your arm needs checked out before it gets infected." She took me by the arm. "Evelyn, please."

"You saw what Ra's did," I said evenly. "You know what he's _planning_ to do. You know what he could do to _Bruce_. You know I can't let that happen." I pulled my mask off and looked her in the eye. "Please, Charlotte. You've got to help me." She closed her eyes, pursed her lips, then let out a long exhale.

"What sort of distraction do I need to be?"

* * *

Bruce blocked another punch from Ra's with his forearm, dropping to one knee to avoid a high kick, then lunging back to dodge another punch. He swung at his former teacher with an attack of his own, one that was easily blocked.

"What's your plan, Ra's?" Bruce asked, teeth clenched as he blocked a series of jabs from Ra's.

"That's not something you should trouble yourself with, Bruce," replied Ra's icily. "You won't be around long enough for it to matter. No one in Gotham will." _I beg to differ,_ Bruce thought bitterly. A sudden swoosh of brown hair underneath the streetlamp to the battling men's right caught Bruce's eye, but he had to block another kick instead of looking. _That better not be who I think it is_, he thought.

"Hey! Ra's!"

_God. Dammit. _

Ra's jumped backward, landing several yards from Bruce and turning toward the source of the voice. Bruce turned as well, glowering beneath his mask.

"Charlotte," Ra's said pleasantly. "I thought you'd gone." _So had I,_ Bruce thought, looking around for that familiar head of red hair. Evelyn wouldn't have left Charlotte here alone. It was probably her plan to begin with to come back. _She's got a real problem with listening_, Bruce thought.

"You're a terrible alchemist, you know," Charlotte said, flipping her hair out of her face with a jerk of her head. She had her gaze locked on Ra's. "I mean, really. Twelve decades and still the best you can do is a little ground moving?" She scoffed. "When you were with Gregory and me, you couldn't even fix a _vase_ after a week. _Evelyn_ could build a house in that time. And look at you now, Ra's! You've had _hours_ to level Gotham and what've you got to show for it? One demolished building? Hah! If you were _half_ the alchemist Greg was, Gotham would be nothing but rubble and bodies." Bruce, even in the dim light from the street lamp, could see Ra's twitch and curl his upper lip at Charlotte. "Looks like you're all bark and no bite!"

An angry shout pierced the air. Bruce had turned his attention back to Charlotte, and he assumed the shout was from Ra's, Charlotte's comments finally getting to him. Then he brought his eyes back to the villain just as a green light blinded him, and he caught a glimpse of scarlet hair flying and his heart sank down into the soles of his feet as the alchemic light engulfed the entire street.

"Evelyn!"

* * *

I didn't really have enough time to make something to bind Ra's to. Actually, I was contemplating a trash can when the glint of an unbroken hand mirror, sticking up from a dumpster caught my eye. I snatched it up, grinning.

I hadn't told Charlotte my plan because I knew she'd never let me even attempt it. Not with how little alchemic experience she _thought_ I had. Truth is, I knew more alchemy that her and Greg had taught me. After I finished training with them, I started to learn alchemy, transmutation circles, formulas and such on my own, teaching myself through trial and error (and a lot of it). The trick I was planning to use on Ra's was something I'd picked up from a website, one of the few that I found on the web that actually worked. It was a transmutation to bind someone to something inert. The only thing I'd ever even tried it on was a cute little white mouse that I bound to a dollar-store compact. It had worked, though, but I never really learned how to get the thing back _out_ after I'd bound it.

Good thing I wouldn't have to worry about that happening with Ra's.

The only flaw in my plan to bind Ra's to the hand mirror I'd grabbed was that it would take an enormous amount of energy. Energy that I wasn't sure I had anywhere. I could only hope that what I was planning wasn't going to kill me. If it did, then my entire plan wouldn't matter because there'd be no me to live in the Gotham I saved. If it _did_ work and it _didn't _kill me, though, then that psychopathic bearded fiend would be locked up, even if it was just temporary. I mean, if anyone ever broke this mirror, then Ra's would be out, and he'd be back with a vengeance.

As I made my way after Charlotte (I'd sent her ahead to distract Ra's while I tried to find something to bind him to) I drew a transmutation circle on the face and on the back of the mirror. I didn't have my chalk, so I pulled off my glove and used the sticky blood that had accumulated all around where the ninja had slashed me. Blood would probably be more effective than chalk, anyway.

The transmutation circle took up the entire face and back of the mirror, and it was one of the more complex ones that I knew. I just hoped that I didn't screw it up anywhere, or I might be the one getting stuck in the mirror.

That would certainly be a very bad day for me.

I finished the edges of the circle just as I rounded the corner and Ra's, Bruce and Charlotte came into view. I knew Charlotte must be doing a good job of distracting Ra's, because she was shouting something about him being a lousy alchemist. _That'll push his buttons,_ I thought with a small grin. _It would certainly press mine._ I didn't even stop, but sprinted towards Ra's, my bare hand covering the back of the mirror. I saw Bruce turn his head as I let out an enraged shout and slammed the mirror's face onto Ra's' back.

When glass and blood collided with Ra's, a bright green light ignited and flared, lighting up the entire street, cloaking Ra's and myself and blinding anyone who was watching. I could barely hear someone –Bruce, I had to assume, unless Charlotte just had an enormous boost in testosterone—shout my name, and the sound practically wrenched my heart right from my chest. _Great. Now I'm feeling guilty for doing this since it might kill me,_ I thought cynically. _Typical._

There was a sudden force against my hand as the transmutation surged up suddenly, and the force sent me flying backward and disoriented the hell out of me. So much that when I hit the ground, I couldn't tell if the blackness I was seeing was the asphalt or the night sky. I determined after staring past the floating white orbs that currently dominated my vision that I was lying on my back, staring up at the sky and the lights from the buildings around me. My ears popped and started to ring, and the white spots turned to black and overran my vision and unconsciousness reigned and I was out.

* * *

"Evelyn!"

"You idiot!"

This last statement was from Charlotte as she ran to catch the mirror. It had flown several dozen feet into the air after the transmutation had reached its climax, and due to the fact that Ra's was nowhere to be seen, she had to guess Evelyn had actually succeeded. "I can't believe she even _attempted_ that! I would never have tried that at her level!" Charlotte caught the mirror in both hands, staring at the now gray glossy surface. It offered no reflection.

"She did it," Charlotte said, unbelieving. "She really did it. Look!" The brunette and accomplished alchemist stared up, bewildered, at Bruce. The vigilante, however, was bent carefully over Evelyn. Charlotte's expression turned to one of slack blankness, her face wiped of all emotion like creating a clean slate. "Oh no." She clutched the mirror in one hand and sprinted to Bruce's side, crouching opposite him.

"She's breathing," Bruce said quietly, gently letting his hand grace the wound on her arm.

"Lucky her," Charlotte said, ever acrimonious. "That kind of transmutation would have killed anyone else without training. She must've learned it well."

"You didn't teach it to her?" Bruce looked up at Charlotte.

"Of course not!" She seemed taken aback at the effrontery of the thought. "Greg and I would never have taught Eve anything like that. We knew she was a baby alchemist, and if she knew how to bind people and animals to objects, who knows what she would have done to those girls at her boarding school? They didn't get along at all, mind you, always resenting her for how much her family owned and—"

"Charlotte," Bruce said evenly, effectively cutting her sentence short. "What about Evelyn?"

Charlotte stared at the red-head, long and hard. On one side, Evelyn could be completely fine. A transmutation like that would have consumed an insurmountable amount of energy, possibly draining it from her cells, leaving only enough for her to stay alive, barely. If that were the case, all that would need to happen would be an undeterminable waiting period until Evelyn awoke, ravenous and eager to consume her weight in food to regain all the energy she'd lost. Then it would just be a matter of running a couple easy tests to ascertain that no serious complications from such a ridiculously executed transmutation existed. That was the best-case scenario. The worst case?

She would never wake up.

"Um." Charlotte pondered telling Bruce a lie or the truth. She could tell him that Evelyn was going to be completely fine, and that she'd wake up in a few days. Or she could tell him both possibilities, and pray for the best.

Charlotte did pride herself on her ability to lie.

"She'll be all right in a few days, give or take," she said with a short nod. "But she'll be hungry when she gets up. All that energy burned needs to come back somehow." She smiled at Bruce, hoping he was convinced.

If he wasn't, he didn't show it.

"I'm taking her back to the Cave," he said, gently and gracefully sweeping Evelyn up into his arms. It was an effortless movement that Charlotte couldn't help but marvel at.

"Should I just wait back at the manor, then?" she asked, pushing herself to her feet, the mirror still in hand. "Before I go, though, I think you should know I know, well,…_you know_, and that Evelyn didn't tell me and that I found out completely on my own, and that I won't tell a soul." He stared at her, the perpetual glare from his cowl making her cringe slightly. She inhaled deeply, crossed her heart and kissed her fingertips, then extended her fingers as though she were releasing a bird. "Alchemist's honor." He didn't say anything; just stared at her for another grueling five seconds, then turned and stalked off. Probably for the Batmobile, if Charlotte had to guess. "Is that an 'I-don't-care-you-know' glare or an 'I-hate-you-' glare?" she called after him. Silence was her only answer, and she had the distinct feeling she was alone on the street, save for the mirror.

"I'm going to take that as an 'I-hate-you' glare."

* * *

For a long time, I thought I'd died.

After the transmutation had climaxed and sent me flying and I blacked out, I thought I died. I thought that after the darkness of my subconscious had faded into light, and I saw myself (it was a total imaginary out-of-body experience) on the ground like I was dead, I thought I was dead. I thought for sure I was now a specter, floating next to my corpse before I was dragged to the other-side by some unseen force.

Then Bruce entered my field of vision in a bunny suit, and I figured I must be dreaming.

Luckily I was, and I awoke with quite a start in my bed back at Wayne Manor. I could feel my heart pounding against my chest like a tribal drum, and I gauged by how long it took my eyes to adjust to the nonexistent light in the room that it must have been late. When I turned to read my digital clock, it was the exact opposite. It was early, almost four in the morning. So I guess, depending on how you look at it, it was either really late or ridiculously early.

Regardless I was alone in the room, and I flung the covers off of my legs.

I was unfathomably hungry, and my stomach growled like a police dog would at someone packing dope and I pushed myself to my feet. The room immediately began to spin and I squeezed my eyes shut.

After my dizzy spell was over and I was done grasping the bed post for support, I made my way across the room to the door.

I opened and was greeted by Bruce, arm outstretched and silhouetted by the light from the hallway. It looked like he was just about to open my door and we stared at each other for several long seconds, me with my mouth open like a turkey in the rain.

"Evelyn," he whispered, and suddenly my chest ignited like it always did when he said my name, and tears sprung unwanted to my eyes. With a small cry I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around him at the chest and buried my face into his shirt. I could only guess that the pent up emotions from my decision to attempt a life-threatening transmutation and _surviving_, coupled with the fact I hadn't eaten anything in god-knows how long caught up with me in an ardent display of tears and choked sobs into Bruce's cotton tee-shirt.

It took almost a full minute for me to compose myself, and when I did I gently removed myself from Bruce's grasp and took a deep, shuddering breath.

"Sorry," I mumbled, still embarrassed to admit that I was pretty sure I was in love with him. "Haven't eaten. Gets me all sorts of riled up and I start acting really crazy." I was staring at my feet. "I think it's just a low blood-sugar issue that I can fix with some tea or—" Bruce's hand was in my vision suddenly and he tilted my chin up. His face was inches from mine, and I knew I must have been redder than an Irishman on St. Patty's Day.

It didn't matter that he and I had been (technically) living together, or that I knew he was Batman, or that he'd saved me more than once, or that we'd shared our first kiss in the Batcave of all places, or that I knew—dear god above—I loved him more than I loved my gerbil from my academy days. (I cried for months after he left on that gerbil cruise my mum always told me about). And it didn't matter that I used to hate how everything on the television or radio was always something about Batman and how Engle couldn't ever shut up about him on _Gotham Tonight_, or that Michelle told me I'd never get Bruce Wayne for myself.

It didn't matter because every time he was so close that I could feel his warm breath on my lips my knees would start to shake and butterflies emerged from their cocoons to fill my stomach with a fluttering, weightless sensation. My palms went clammy and my limbs inert and I didn't ever think I could keep the blood flowing my brain to keep me conscious.

Then Bruce's lips melded with my own and the butterflies evaporated into pleasant warmth, and the coolness left my hands, and my knees found their strength and I dug my toes into the carpet, lifting my heels to press our lips more closely together. I slipped a hand into his hair, my other finding his cheek and he put one hand to my back, the other my waist.

And then my bad arm hit the door frame.

My eyes widened and I opened my mouth against Bruce's to cry out. I dropped my onto my heels, shuffling backwards, holding my arm and cursing loudly, ending with a shouted, "OW!"

Suddenly a sound was filling the room that I wasn't sure I'd ever hear, and wasn't sure I'd hear again.

Laughter.

And it was coming from Bruce.

I guess all that stress he built up from worrying over me and his definite lack of sleep finally caught up with him and he'd lost his mind. I wanted to ask him if he'd like me to drive him to Arkham or if he'd rather drive himself, but all that came out was, "That wasn't funny." Yet a small giggle as the last syllable of 'funny' left my mouth betrayed my word. Oh, it was funny.

It was a regular laugh riot, it was.

Can you even imagine? An intimate moment ruined by an injury from a ninja.

Boy, I'd have fun explaining _that_ to Michelle.

I joined Bruce in his laughter, then, and laughed so hard my sides started to hurt. I momentarily stopped, and so did Bruce, but just a glance at one another sent us back into our mirth.

When we (finally) calmed, I smiled up at him, one hand still on my bad arm. "So," I began, tracing a circle in the carpet with my toe. "I'm starving."

He smiled, and downstairs we went and, at four in the morning, I had the best breakfast of my life, made by the best billionaire playboy I'd ever had the fancy of meeting.

I didn't know whether I could consider Bruce and me an 'item' or not.

But this was sure a good start.

* * *

Thanks for all my wonderful readers and reviewers! I really appreciate all the love I'm feelin' from you all! Thanks and thanks and thanks twelve hundred times over!


	21. AUTHOR'S NOTE

A note to my watchers!

I'm edited and re-submitting all of _Never Met a Girl Like You Before! _

This time with more AWESOME.

Actually, I feel that my first chapters are seriously...lacking in everything (not to mention there's one GLARING plot hole that I thankfully fixed) and- after re-reading my story- I elected that some editing was definitely in order.

So you can all look forward to some nice edited chapters that have been cleaned up and beautified.

Thanks, again, for all the awesome reviews and thanks to you all!


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